Quotes from Robert Louis Stevenson

No human being ever spoke of scenery for above two minutes at a time, which makes me suspect that we hear too much of it in literature.

My idea of man's chief end was to enrich the world with things of beauty, and have a fairly good time myself while doing so.

Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well.

Keep your eyes open to your mercies. The man who forgets to be thankful has fallen asleep in life.

Every heart that has beat strongly and cheerfully has left a hopeful impulse behind it in the world, and bettered the tradition of mankind.

The world is full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings.

His friends were those of his own blood or those whom he had known the longest; his affections, like ivy, were the growth of time, they implied no aptness in the object.

And if a man reads very hard, as the old anecdote reminds us, he will have little time for thought.

We do not go to cowards for tender dealing; there is nothing so cruel as panic; the man who has least fear for his own carcase, has most time to consider others.

The obscurest epoch is to-day.

To love is the great amulet that makes this world a garden.

So long as we love we serve; so long as we are loved by others, I would almost say that we are indispensable; and no man is useless while he has a friend.

The friendly cow, all red and white, I love with all my heart; She gives me cream with all her might, To eat with apple-tart.

The ideal story is that of two people who go into love step for step, with a fluttered consciousness, like a pair of children venturing together into a dark room.

Some people swallow the universe like a pill; they travel on through the world, like smiling images pushed from behind.

It is better to travel hopefully than to arrive.

Faster than fairies, faster than witches, Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches; And charging along like troops in a battle, All through the meadows the horses and cattle

For my part I travel not to go anywhere but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.

The rain is falling all around, It falls on field and tree, It rains on the umbrellas here, And on the ships at sea. - Rain

Each has his own tree of ancestors, but at the top of all sits Probably Arboreal.

Wealth I ask not, hope nor love, Nor a friend to know me; All I seek, the heaven above And the road below me.

Love- what is love? A great and aching heart; Wrung hands; and silence; and a long despair

If they only married when they fell in love, most people would die unwed.

The correction of silence is what kills; when you know you have transgressed, and your friend says nothing, and avoids your eye.