“It was a joke to the extent in the context of the views that speech.”

“There are generally three kinds of people in the world. People who make things happen, people who watch things happen, and people who say, what in the heck happened.”

“...the possibility of success was motivating me more than the fear of failure.”

“(Finland is a famously introverted nation. Finnish joke: How can you tell if a Finn likes you? He's staring at your shoes instead of his own.)”

“Report of Daniel Webster's Speech in the U.S. Senate”

“There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own.”

“It is—or seems to be—a wise sort of thing, to realise that all that happens to a man in this life is only by way of joke, especially his misfortunes, if he have them. And it is also worth bearing in mind, that the joke is passed round pretty liberally & impartially, so that not very many are entitled to fancy that they in particular are getting the worst of it.”