Interest

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author

The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one's own country as a foreign land

People commonly travel the world over to see rivers and mountains, new stars, garish birds, freak fish, grotesque breeds of human; they fall into an animal stupor that gapes at existence and they think they have seen something

The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing , to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts, not a select party

Never be entirely idle; but either be reading, or writing, or praying or meditating or endeavoring something for the public good

Private passions tire and exhaust themselves, public ones never

The people only understand what they can feel; the only orators that can affect them are those who move them

Not many sounds in life, and I include all urban and rural sounds, exceed in interest a knock at the door

The teller of a mirthful tale has latitude allowed him. We are content with less than absolute truth

The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things

All men are liable to error; and most men are, in many points, by passion or interest, under temptation to it

The world loves a spice of wickedness

Man lives for science as well as bread.

I have never been bored an hour in my life. I get up every morning wondering what new strange glamorous thing is going to happen and it happens at fairly regular intervals

Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young

While one finds company in himself and his pursuits, he cannot feel old, no matter what his years may be

A reader seldom peruses a book with pleasure until he knows whether the writer of it be a black man or a fair man, of a mild or choleric disposition, married or a bachelor

To a man of pleasure every moment appears to be lost, which partakes not of the vivacity of amusement

The post office has a great charm at one point of our lives. When you have lived to my age, you will begin to think letters are never worth going through the rain for

Less than fifteen percent of the people do any original thinking on any subject . . . The greatest torture in the world for most people is to think