Diarists

"Here is a golden Rule to begin with. Write legibly. The average temper of the human race would be perceptibly sweetened, if everybody obeyed this Rule! A great deal of the bad writing in the world comes simply from writing too quickly."

"Put the date in full. It is another aggravating thing, when you wish, years afterwards, to arrange a series of letters, to find them dated "Feb. 17", "Aug. 2", without any year to guide you as to which comes first. And never, never, dear Madam (N.B. this remark is addressed to ladies only: no man would ever do such a thing), put "Wednesday", simply, as the date!"

"If the Letter is to be in answer to another, begin by getting out that other letter and reading it through, in order to refresh your memory, as to what it is you have to answer, and as to your correspondent’s present address (otherwise you will be sending your letter to his regular address in London, though he has been careful in writing to give you his Torquay address in full)."

"Since I have possessed a "Wonderland Stamp Case", Life has been bright and peaceful, and I have used no other. I believe the Queen's laundress uses no other."

"Some American writer has said “the snakes in this district may be divided into one species—the venomous”. The same principle applies here. Postage-Stamp-Cases may be divided into one species, the “Wonderland”. Imitations of it will soon appear, no doubt: but they cannot include the two Pictorial Surprises, which are copyright.You don't see why I call them 'Surprises'? Well, take the Case in your left hand, and regard it attentively. You see Alice nursing the Duchess's Baby ? (An entirely new combination, by the way : it doesn't occur in the book.) Now, with your right thumb and forefinger, lay hold of the little book, and suddenly pull it out. The Baby has turned into a Pig I If that doesn't surprise you, why, I suppose you wouldn't be surprised if your own Mother-in-law suddenly turned into a Gyroscope!"

"Fading, with the Night, the memory of a dead love, and the withered leaves of a blighted hope, and the sickly repinings and moody regrets that numb the best energies of the soul: and rising, broadening, rolling upward like a living flood, the manly resolve, and the dauntless will, and the heavenward gaze of faith — the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen! "Look Eastward! Aye, look Eastward!""

"The West is the fitting tomb for all the sorrow and the sighing, all the errors and the follies of the Past: for all its withered Hopes and all its buried Loves! From the East comes new strength, new ambition, new Hope, new Life, new Love! Look Eastward! Aye, look Eastward!""

"He thought he saw a Banker's Clerk Descending from the bus: He looked again, and found it was A Hippopotamus: 'If this should stay to dine,' he said, 'There won't be much for us!'"

"He thought he saw an Elephant, That practised on a fife: He looked again, and found it was A letter from his wife. 'At length I realise,' he said, 'The bitterness of Life!'"

"Less Bread! More Taxes!--and then all the people cheered again, and one man, who was more excited than the rest, flung his hat high into the air, and shouted (as well as I could make out) "Who roar for the Sub-Warden?" Everybody roared, but whether it was for the Sub-Warden, or not, did not clearly appear: some were shouting "Bread!" and some "Taxes!", but no one seemed to know what it was they really wanted."

"I believe this thought, of the possibility of death — if calmly realised, and steadily faced would be one of the best possible tests as to our going to any scene of amusement being right or wrong. If the thought of sudden death acquires, for you, a special horror when imagined as happening in a theatre, then be very sure the theatre is harmful for you, however harmless it may be for others; and that you are incurring a deadly peril in going. Be sure the safest rule is that we should not dare to live in any scene in which we dare not die. But, once realise what the true object is in life — that it is not pleasure, not knowledge, not even fame itself, 'that last infirmity of noble minds' — but that it is the development of character, the rising to a higher, nobler, purer standard, the building-up of the perfect Man — and then, so long as we feel that this is going on, and will (we trust) go on for evermore, death has for us no terror; it is not a shadow, but a light; not an end, but a beginning!"

"I do not know if 'Alice in Wonderland' was an original story — I was, at least, no conscious imitator in writing it — but I do know that, since it came out, something like a dozen story-books have appeared, on identically the same pattern. The path I timidly explored believing myself to be 'the first that ever burst into that silent sea' — is now a beaten high-road: all the way-side flowers have long ago been trampled into the dust: and it would be courting disaster for me to attempt that style again."

"Is all our Life, then, but a dream Seen faintly in the golden gleam Athwart Time's dark resistless stream?Bowed to the earth with bitter woe Or laughing at some raree-show We flutter idly to and fro.Man's little Day in haste we spend, And, from its merry noontide, send No glance to meet the silent end."

"Blow, blow your trumpets till they crack, Ye little men of little souls! And bid them huddle at your back - Gold-sucking leeches, shoals on shoals!Fill all the air with hungry wails - "Reward us, ere we think or write! Without your Gold mere Knowledge fails To sate the swinish appetite!""

"The air is bright with hues of light And rich with laughter and with singing: Young hearts beat high in ecstasy, And banners wave, and bells are ringing: But silence falls with fading day, And there's an end to mirth and play. Ah, well-a-day!"

"A sadder vision yet: thine aged sire Shaming his hoary locks with treacherous wile! And dost thou now doubt Truth to be a liar? And wilt thou die, that hast forgot to smile?"

"A change came o'er my Vision - it was night: We clove a pathway through a frantic throng: The steeds, wild-plunging, filled us with affright: The chariots whirled along.Within a marble hall a river ran - A living tide, half muslin and half cloth: And here one mourned a broken wreath or fan, Yet swallowed down her wrath"

"Yet what are all such gaieties to me Whose thoughts are full of indices and surds? x2+7x+53 =11/3."

"'O gin I find anither ladye,' He said wi' sighs and tears, 'I wot my coortin' sall not be Anither thirty years:'For gin I find a ladye gay, Exactly to my taste, I'll pop the question, aye or nay, In twenty years at maist.'"

"Then proudly smiled that old man To see the eager lad Rush madly for his pen and ink And for his blotting-pad – But, when he thought of publishing, His face grew stern and sad."

"I NEVER loved a dear Gazelle – Nor anything that cost me much: High prices profit those who sell, but why should I be fond of such?"

"Finally my Hiawatha Tumbled all the tribe together, ('Grouped' is not the right expression), And, as happy chance would have it Did at last obtain a picture Where the faces all succeeded: Each came out a perfect likeness.Then they joined and all abused it, Unrestrainedly abused it, As the worst and ugliest picture They could possibly have dreamed of. 'Giving one such strange expressions - Sullen, stupid, pert expressions. Really any one would take us (Any one that did not know us) For the most unpleasant people!' (Hiawatha seemed to think so, Seemed to think it not unlikely.)"

"From his shoulder Hiawatha Took the camera of rosewood, Made of sliding, folding rosewood; Neatly put it all together. In its case it lay compactly, Folded into nearly nothing;But he opened out the hinges, Pushed and pulled the joints and hinges, Till it looked all squares and oblongs, Like a complicated figure In the Second Book of Euclid."

"There is an insect that people avoid (Whence is derived the verb 'to flee'). Where have you been by it most annoyed? In lodgings by the Sea."

"There are certain things - as, a spider, a ghost, The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three - That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most Is a thing they call the Sea."

"Lady Clara Vere de Vere Was eight years old, she said: Every ringlet, lightly shaken, ran itself in golden thread."

"So, to reward him for his run (As it was baking hot, And he was over twenty stone), The King proceeded, half in fun, To knight him on the spot."

"He is immensely fat, and so Well suits the occupation: In point of fact, if you must know, We used to call him years ago, THE MAYOR AND CORPORATION!"

"Who's the Knight-Mayor?" I cried. Instead Of answering my question, "Well, if you don't know THAT," he said, "Either you never go to bed, Or you've a grand digestion!"

"My father was a Brownie, Sir; My mother was a Fairy. The notion had occurred to her, The children would be happier, If they were taught to vary. The notion soon became a craze; And, when it once began, she Brought us all out in different ways - One was a Pixy, two were Fays, Another was a Banshee."

"Oh, when I was a little Ghost, A merry time had we! Each seated on his favourite post, We chumped and chawed the buttered toast They gave us for our tea."

"Now that's a thing I WILL NOT STAND, And so I tell you flat."

"That narrow window, I expect, Serves but to let the dusk in - " "But please," said I, "to recollect 'Twas fashioned by an architect Who pinned his faith on Ruskin!"

"Port-wine, he says, when rich and sound, Warms his old bones like nectar: And as the inns, where it is found, Are his especial hunting-ground, We call him the INN-SPECTRE."

"Yet still to choose a brat like you, To haunt a man of forty-two, Was no great compliment!""

"And as to being in a fright, Allow me to remark That Ghosts have just as good a right In every way, to fear the light, As Men to fear the dark."

""I've caught a cold," the Thing replies, "Out there upon the landing." I turned to look in some surprise, And there, before my very eyes, A little Ghost was standing!"

"One winter night, at half past nine, Cold, tired, and cross, and muddy, I had come home, too late to dine"

"The rabbits bow before thee, And cower in the straw; The chickens are submissive, And own thy will for law; Bullfinches and canary Thy bidding do obey; And e'en the tortoise in its shell Doth never say thee nay."

"Fair stands the ancient Rectory, The Rectory of Croft, The sun shines bright upon it, The breezes whisper soft. From all the house and garden Its inhabitants come forth, And muster in the road without, And pace in twos and threes about, The children of the North."

"And so it fell upon a day, (That is, it never rose again)"

"The day was wet, the rain fell souse Like jars of strawberry jam, a sound was heard in the old henhouse, A beating of a hammer."

"There was once a young man of Oporta, Who daily got shorter and shorter, The reason he said Was the hod on his head Which was filled with the heaviest mortar."

"What may I do?" at length I cried, Tired of the painful task. The fairy quietly replied, And said "You must not ask."

"As you have invited me, I cannot come, for I have made a rule to decline all invitations; but I will come the next day."

"But surely you trust God! Do you think He would let you come to harm? To be afraid is to distrust."

""And at last we've got to the end of this ideal racecourse! Now that you accept A and B and C and D, of course you accept Z." "Do I?" said the Tortoise innocently. "Let's make that quite clear. I accept A and B and C and D. Suppose I still refused to accept Z?" "Then Logic would take you by the throat, and force you to do it!" Achilles triumphantly replied. "Logic would tell you, 'You can't help yourself. Now that you've accepted A and B and C and D, you must accept Z!' So you've no choice, you see." "Whatever Logic is good enough to tell me is worth writing down," said the Tortoise. "So enter it in your notebook, please. We will call it (E) If A and B and C and D are true, Z must be true. Until I've granted that, of course I needn't grant Z. So it's quite a necessary step, you see?" "I see," said Achilles; and there was a touch of sadness in his tone."

"If you want to inspire confidence, give plenty of statistics – it does not matter that they should be accurate, or even intelligible, so long as there is enough of them."

"I charm in vain; for never again, All keenly as my glance I bend, Will Memory, goddess coy, Embody for my joy Departed days, nor let me gaze On thee, my fairy friend!"

"To Her, whose children's smiles fed the narrator's fancy and were his rich reward: from the Author."