A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide. |
A river is more than an amenity, it is a treasure |
A thought is often original, though you have uttered it a hundred times. |
A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged, it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used |
Age, like distance, lends a double charm. |
All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called ''facts.'' They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain. Who does not know fellows that always have an ill-conditioned fact or two that they lead after them into decent company like so many bull-dogs, ready to let them slip at every ingenious suggestion, or convenient generalization, or pleasant fancy? I allow no ''facts'' at this table. |
An artist that works in marble or colors has them all to himself and his tribe, but the man who molds his thoughts in verse has to employ the materials vulgarized by everybody's use, and glorify them by his handling |
And now they keep an oyster shop for mermaids down below. |
And silence, like a poultice, comes to heal the blows of sound |
And since, I never dare to write / As funny as I can. |
And when you stick on conversation's burrs, don't strew your pathway with those dreadful urs |
Apology is only egotism wrong side out. |
Beauty is the index of a larger fact than wisdom. |
Between two groups of people who want to make inconsistent kinds of worlds, I see no remedy but force. |
Beware how you take away hope from another human being. |