Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. The Karamazov Brothers

The measure of a person's disposition is this: ... how great is the distance between his understanding and his actions. Basically we all understand the highest. A child, the simplest person, and the wisest all understand the highest. ... But what makes the difference is whether we understand it at a distance—so that we do not act accordingly, or close at hand—so that we act accordingly and "cannot do otherwise." Works of Love

It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour. A Christmas Carol

To write weekly, to write daily, to write shortly, to write for busy people catching trains in the morning or for tired people coming home in the evening, is a heartbreaking task for men who know good writing from bad. They do it, but instinctively draw out of harm's way anything precious that might be damaged by contact with the public, or anything sharp that might irritate its skin. The Common Reader