George Bernard Shaw

Youth is wasted on the young.

You don’t stop laughing when you grow old, you grow old when you stop laughing.

I never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from people.

Man is the only animal of which I am thoroughly and cravenly afraid of.

I was a freethinker before I knew how to think.

Some men see things as they are and ask why. Others dream things that never were and ask why not.

Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it. Many will read the book before one thinks of quoting a passage. As soon as he has done this, that line will be quoted east and west.

I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.

Eastward I go only by force; but westward I go free.

I have been breaking silence these twenty-three years and have hardly made a rent in it.

Love is indeed Heaven upon Earth; since Heaven above would not be Heaven without it: For where there is not Love; there is Fear: But perfect Love casts out Fear. And yet we naturally fear most to offend what we most Love. What we Love, we’ll Hear; what we Love, we’ll Trust; and what we Love, we’ll serve, ay, and suffer for too. If you love me (says our Blessed Redeemer) keep my Commandments. Why? Why then he’ll Love us; then we shall be his Friends; then he’ll send us the Comforter; then whatsoever we ask, we shall receive; and then where he is we shall be also, and that for ever. Behold the Fruits of Love; the Power, Vertue, Benefit and Beauty of Love! Love is above all; and when it prevails in us all, we shall all be Lovely, and in Love with God and one with another.

My most brilliant achievement was my ability to be able to persuade my wife to marry me.

It is a severe Rebuke upon us, that God makes us so many Allowances, and we make so few to our Neighbor: As if Charity had nothing to do with Religion; Or Love with Faith, that ought to work by it.

The arts and inventions of each period are only its costume, and do not invigorate men.

A man of genius has been seldom ruined but by himself.

Nothing is ever accomplished by a reasonable man.

Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads.

The best part of beauty is that which no picture can express.

Meditation is the dissolution of thoughts in Eternal awareness or Pure consciousness without objectification, knowing without thinking, merging finitude in infinity.

Be true to your work, your word, and your friend.

The sense of an entailed disadvantage – the deformed foot doubtfully hidden by the shoe, makes a restlessly active spiritual yeast, and easily turns a self-centered, unloving nature into an Ishmaelite. But in the rarer sort, who presently see their own frustrated claim as one among a myriad, the inexorable sorrow takes the form of fellowship and makes the imagination tender.