George Bernard Shaw

The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them.

The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one really inflexible point of honor.

Here there is no hope, and consequently no duty, no work, nothing to be gained by praying, nothing to be lost by doing what you like. Hell, in short, is a place where you have nothing to do but amuse yourself.

Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.

We know now that the soul is the body, and the body the soul. They tell us they are different because they want to persuade us that we can keep our souls if we let them make slaves of our bodies.

I’m an atheist and I thank God for it.

There must be what Mr. Gladstone many years ago called a blessed act of oblivion. We must all turn our backs upon the horrors of the past. We must look to the future. We cannot afford to drag forward across the years that are to come the hatreds and revenges which have sprung from the injuries of the past.

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.

Universities are of course hostile to geniuses, which, seeing and using ways of their own, discredit the routine: as churches and monasteries persecute youthful saints.

Every book is a quotation; and every house is a quotation out of all forests, and mines, and stone quarries; and every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.

The good rain, like a bad preacher, does not know when to leave off.

If your mind isn’t clouded by unnecessary things, this is the best season of your life.

The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.

To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge.

What you don’t do can be a destructive force.

I really do not see much use in exalting the humble and meek; they do not remain humble and meek long when they are exalted.

The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.

Although the road is never ending, take a step and keep walking, do not look fearfully into the distance…on the path let the heart be your guide for the body is hesitant and full of fear.

You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.

When a man says money can do anything, that settles it: he hasn’t got any.

I cannot pretend to feel impartial about colors. I rejoice with the brilliant ones and am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.