Samuel Butler

The youth of an art is, like the youth of anything else, its most interesting period. When it has come to the knowledge of good and evil it is stronger, but we care less about it.

Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.

All philosophies, if you ride them home, are nonsense, but some are greater nonsense than others.

In old times people used to try and square the circle; now they try and devise schemes for satisfying the Irish nation.

All truth is not to be told at all times.

And so there is no God but has been in the loins of past gods.

God cannot alter the past, though historians can.

Christ: I dislike him very much. Still, I can stand him. What I cannot stand is the wretched band of people whose profession is to hoodwink us about him.

The advantage of doing one's praising for oneself is that one can lay it on so thick and exactly in the right places.

Justice is my being allowed to do whatever I like. Injustice is whatever prevents my doing so.

Justice while she winks at crimes, Stumbles on innocence sometimes.

The most important service rendered by the press and the magazines is that of educating people to approach printed matter with distrust.