Quotes from Phyllis Bottome

Curiosity is the only thing that really carries through time, isn't it? The creative curiosity, I mean, which fights its way into expression?

Truth, though it has many disadvantages, is at least changeless. You can always find it where you left it.

Truth is no man's slave - but lies - what magnificent servants they make.

The two best subjects for conversation are talking shop and making love.

Poets, when they write of love, give themselves and everyone else away!

We cannot alter facts, but we can alter our ways of looking at them.

No emergency excuses you from exercising tolerance.

There are two ways of meeting difficulties. You alter the difficulties or you alter yourself to meet them.

It is a very dangerous thing to have an idea that you will not practice.

There is no thermometer for wants!

To see a shadow and think it is a tree-that is a pity; but to see a tree and to think it a shadow can be fatal.

Luck enters into every contingency. You are a fool if you forget it-and a greater fool if you count upon it.

Marriage! ... Why, it is like living in a thimble with a hippopotamus!

Lots of men hate women now-a-days. ... It was a man-made world, and now we're asking to go shares in the making.

Neither saints nor angels have ever increased my faith in this enigma Life; but what are called 'common men and women' have increased it.

with courage a human being is safe enough. And without it - he is never for one instant safe!

All persecution is a sign of fear; for if we did not fear the power of an opinion different from our own, we should not mind others holding it.

A red-hot belief in eternal glory is probably the best antidote to human panic that there is.

I am never at picnics. The ground was not meant to be sat upon in its raw state, I feel sure, and I prefer my food without either caterpillars or drafts!