Pessimism Does Win Us Great Happy Moments.

There Is In The Human Race Some Dark Spirit Of Recalcitrance, Always Pulling Us In The Direction Contrary To That In Which We Are Reasonably Expected To Go.

To Give And Then Not Feel That One Has Given Is The Very Best Of All Ways Of Giving.

Men Prominent In Life Are Mostly Hard To Converse With. They Lack Small-talk, And At The Same Time One Doesn't Like To Confront Them With Their Own Great Themes.

Few, As I Have Said, Are The Humorists Who Can Induce This State. To Master And Dissolve Us, To Give Us The Joy Of Being Worn Down And Tired Out With Laughter, Is A Success To Be Won By No Man Save In Virtue Of A Rare Staying-power. Laughter Becomes Extreme Only If It Be Consecutive. There Must Be No Pauses For Recovery. Touch-and-go Humour, However Happy, Is Not Enough. The Jester Must Be Able To Grapple His Theme And Hang On To It, Twisting It This Way And That, And Making It Yield Magically All Manner Of Strange And Precious Things.

Not That I Had Any Special Reason For Hating School. Strange As It May Seem To My Readers, I Was Not Unpopular There. I Was A Modest, Good-humoured Boy. It Is Oxford That Has Made Me Insufferable.