America is rather like life. You can usually find in it what you look for. It will probably be interesting, and it is sure to be large."

"At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity."

Ideas are fatal to caste.

"I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have yet got ourselves."

The people I respect most behave as if they were immortal and as if society was eternal.