"I won't tell you that the world matters nothing, or the world's voice, or the voice of society. They matter a good deal. They matter far too much. But there are moments when one has to choose between living one's own life, fully, entirely, completely—or dragging out some false, shallow, degrading existence that the world in its hypocrisy demands. You have that moment now. Choose!"
"Bad people are, from the point of view of art, fascinating studies. They represent colour, variety and strangeness. Good people exasperate one's reason; bad people stir one's imagination."
"If you don't get everything you want, think of the things you don't get that you don't want."
"The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional."
"There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating: people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing."
"We live in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities."