“You need not wonder whether you should have an unreliable person as a friend. An unreliable person is nobody's friend.”

“A certain person may have, as you say, a wonderful presence; I do not know. What I do know is that he has a perfectly delightful absence.”

“You say that this society will come to an end, because societies always have done so. I wonder whether they have ended because they were not really societies at all.”

“Who is the wrong person to criticise?You”

“Enemies are often former or potential friends who have been denied - or think that they have been denied - something.”

“A generous person may not have wisdom: but, unlike others, he has the means to gain it.”

“What can you do with a person who says that he is absolutely uncertain about everything, and that he is absolutely certain about that?”