Of all God's creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the lash. That one is the cat.
- Notebook, 1894

The highest perfection of politeness is only a beautiful edifice, built, from the base to the dome, of graceful and gilded forms of charitable and unselfish lying.

Human beings can be awful cruel to one another.

Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

His head was an hour-glass; it could stow an idea, but it had to do it a grain at a time, not the whole idea at once.