“Writing a book is an adventure. To begin with it is a toy and an amusement. Then it becomes a mistress, then it becomes a master, then it becomes a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster and fling him to the public.”

“Writing a long and substantial book is like having a friend and companion at your side, to whom you can always turn for comfort and amusement, and whose society becomes more attractive as a new and widening field of interest is lighted in the mind.”

“A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him.”

“I was myself so smitten in public opinion that it was the almost universal view that my political life was at last ended.”

“We shall see how the counsels of prudence and restraint may become the prime agents of mortal danger; how the middle course adopted from desires for safety and a quiet life may be found to lead direct to the bull's-eye of disaster.”

“When you have to kill a man it costs nothing to be polite.”

“Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning.”