Society and the World

Ability is not something to be saved, like money, in the hope that you can draw interest on it. The interest comes from the spending. Unused ability, like unused muscles, will atrophy.

A special ability means a heavy expenditure of energy in a particular direction, with a consequent drain from some other side of life.

Ability and achievement are bona fides no one dares question, no matter how unconventional the man who presents them.

There are many rare abilities in the world which Fortune never brings to light.

Natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by study.

If you begin by sacrificing yourself to those you love, you will end by hating those to whom you have sacrificed yourself.

Make your cross your crutch; but when you see another man do it, beware of him.

Sentimentality is the error of supposing that quarter can be given or taken in moral conflicts.

Two starving men cannot be twice as hungry as one; but two rascals can be ten times as vicious as one.

Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself.

If you injure your neighbor, better not do it by halves.

When a heretic wishes to avoid martyrdom he speaks of "Orthodoxy, True and False" and demonstrates that the True is his heresy.

When a heretic wishes to avoid martyrdom he speaks of "Orthodoxy, True and False" and demonstrates that the True is his heresy.

Political Economy and Social Economy are amusing intellectual games; but Vital Economy is the Philosopher Stone.

Political Economy and Social Economy are amusing intellectual games; but Vital Economy is the Philosopher Stone.

The Chinese tame fowls by clipping their wings, and women by deforming their feet. A petticoat round the ankles serves equally well.

The Chinese tame fowls by clipping their wings, and women by deforming their feet. A petticoat round the ankles serves equally well.

Acquired notions of propriety are stronger than natural instincts. It is easier to recruit for monasteries and convents than to induce an Arab woman to uncover her mouth in public, or a British officer to walk through Bond Street in a golfing cap on an afternoon in May.

Acquired notions of propriety are stronger than natural instincts. It is easier to recruit for monasteries and convents than to induce an Arab woman to uncover her mouth in public, or a British officer to walk through Bond Street in a golfing cap on an afternoon in May.

Compassion is the fellow-feeling of the unsound.

Compassion is the fellow-feeling of the unsound.

Those who understand evil pardon it: those who resent it destroy it.

If the wicked flourish and the fittest survive, Nature must be the God of rascals.

If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience!