First love is an astounding experience and if the object happens to be totally unworthy and love not really love at all, it makes little difference to the intensity of the pain.

But human nature cannot be content on a diet of honey and if there is nothing in one's life that requires pity, one must invent it for to go through life unpitied would be an unthinkable loss.

It has been noticed that people who are not parents often have a peculiar fondness for children. This is sometimes attributed to a very beautiful nostalgia for a gift denied to them - dream-children, flowers that have only bloomed in imagination - but we think it is rather because they have not the faintest idea how dreadful children are.

If there is one pleasure on earth which surpasses all others, it is leaving a play before the end. I might perhaps except the joy of taking tickets for a play, dining well, sitting on after dinner, and finally not going at all. That, of course, is very heaven.

There are few pleasures like really burrowing one's nose into sweet peas.

If one cannot invent a really convincing lie, it is often better to stick to the truth.

If only life were one long crisis, everyone would be perfect.

Never economize on luxuries.

it is rather depressing to think that one will still be oneself when one is dead, but I dare say one won't be so critical then.

Early poems are a thing it takes years to live down.

The great thing in life is not to be able to do things, because then they are always done for you.

Christmas, so long looming over everyone's head, finally surged up, buried everyone alive and ebbed away, leaving its victims distinctly cross.