Sir Max Beerbohm
» Colleges and Universities » “I was a modest, good-humored boy. It is Oxford that has made me insufferable.”
» Conscience » “The Non-Conformist Conscience makes cowards of us all.”
» Failure » “There is much to be said for failure. It is more interesting than success.”
» Genius » “Men of genius are not quick judges of character. Deep thinking and high imagining blunt that trivial instinct by which you and I size people up.”
» Greatness » “The dullard’s envy of brilliant men is always assuaged by the suspicion that they will come to a bad end.”
» Guests » “One might well say that mankind is divisible into two great classes: hosts and guests.”
» History and Historians » “To give an accurate and exhaustive account of that period would need a far less brilliant pen than mine.”
» Laughter » “Nobody ever died of laughter.”
» Mediocrity » “Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always at its best.”
» Music » “She was one of those people who said ”I don’t know anything about music, but I know what I like.””
» Nonsense » “Good sense about trivialities is better than nonsense about things that matter.”
» Portraits » “It seems to be a law of nature that no man, unless he has some obvious physical deformity, ever is loth to sit for his portrait.”
» Sacrifice » “No fine work can be done without concentration and self-sacrifice and toil and doubt.”
» Vanity » “To say that a man is vain means merely that he is pleased with the effect he produces on other people. A conceited man is satisfied with the effect he produces on himself.”
