Max Beerbohm

“History repeats itself. Historians repeat each other."[1880]”

“Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always at its best. Genius must always have lapses proportionate to its triumphs.”

“One is taught to refrain from irony, because mankind does tend to take it literally. In the hearing of the gods, who hear all, it is conversely unsage to make a simple and direct statement. So what is one to do? The dilema needs a whole volume to itself.”

“Some people are born to lift heavy weights, some are born to juggle golden balls.”

“What a lurid life Oscar Wilde does lead - so full of extraordinary incidents. What a chance for the memoir writers of the next century”

“Only the insane take themselves seriously.”

“Mankind is divisible into two great classes: hosts and guests.”

“Nobody ever died of laughter.”

“You cannot make a man by standing a sheep on its hind-legs. But by standing a flock of sheep in that position you can make a crowd of men.”

“Our hero's unreasoning rage was fed by a not unreasonable jealousy. It was clear to him that Zuleika had forgotten his existence. To-day, as soon as he had killed her love, she had shown him how much less to her was his love than the crowd's. And now again it was only the crowd she cared for. He followed with his eyes her long slender figure as she threaded her way in and out of the crowd, sinuously, confidingly, producing a penny from one lad's elbow, a threepenny-bit from between another's neck and collar, half a crown from another's hair, and always repeating in that flute-like voice of hers: "Well, this is rather queer!”