A man receiving charity always hates his benefactor- it is a fixed characteristic of human nature

The English are not happy unless they are miserable, the Irish are not at peace unless they are at war, and the Scots are not at home unless they are abroad

The crowds in the big towns, with their mild, knobby faces, their bad teeth and gentle manners solid breakfasts and gloomy Sundays, smoky towns and winding roads, green fields and red pillar boxes

The books one reads in childhood, and perhaps most of all the bad and good bad books, create in one's mind a sort of false map of the world, a series of fabulous countries into which one can retreat at odd moments throughout the rest of life, and whi

He was an embittered atheist, the sort of atheist who does not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him

An autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful. A man who gives a good account of himself is probably lying, since any life when viewed from the inside is simply a series of defeats

Political language. . . is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind

Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals

All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others

Not to expose your true feelings to an adult seems to be instinctive from the age of seven or eight onwards