No More Learning

Their chilling touch is over everything. They are vulgarising mankind.

Ordinary people wait till life discloses to them its secrets, but to the
few, to the elect, the mysteries of life are revealed before the veil is
drawn away. Sometimes this is the effect of art, and chiefly of the art
of literature which deals immediately with the passions and the
intellect. But now and then a complex personality takes the place and
assumes the office of art, is, indeed, in its way a real work of art,
Life having its elaborate masterpieces just as poetry has, or sculpture,
or painting.

Thinking is the most unhealthy thing in the world, and people die of it
just as they die of any other disease.

A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite
and it leaves one unsatisfied.

The aim of the liar is simply to charm, to delight, to give pleasure. He
is the very basis of civilised society.

It is quite a mistake to believe, as many people do, that the mind shows
itself in the face. Vice may sometimes write itself in lines and changes
of contour, but that is all. Our faces are really masks given to us to
conceal our minds with.

What on earth should we men do going about with purity and innocence? A
carefully thought-out buttonhole is much more effective.
The only difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the
caprice lasts a little longer.

People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. That may be so,
but at least it is not so superficial as thought is.

It is the spectator and not life that art really mirrors.

Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Conscience and cowardice are really the same things. Conscience is the
trade name of the firm--that is all.

In every sphere of life form is the beginning of things. The rhythmic,
harmonious gestures of dancing convey, Plato tells us, both rhythm and
harmony into the mind. Forms are the food of faith, cried Newman, in one
of those great moments of sincerity that make us admire and know the
man. He was right, though he may not have known how terribly right he
was. The creeds are believed not because they are rational but because
they are repeated. Yes; form is everything. It is the secret of life.
Find expression for a sorrow and it will become dear to you. Find
expression for a joy and you intensify its ecstasy.