They say life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

Then I though of reading - the nice and subtle happiness of reading ... this joy not dulled by age, this polite and unpunishable vice, this selfish, serene, lifelong intoxication.

I might give my life for a friend, but he'd better not ask me to do up a parcel.

How can they say my life is not a success? Have I not for more than sixty years got enough to eat and escaped being eaten?

There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want, and after that to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second.

All my life, as down an abyss without a bottom. I have been pouring van loads of information into that vacancy of oblivion I call my mind.