George Bernard Shaw

I can wait: waiting and patience mean nothing to the eternal. I gave the woman the greatest of gifts: curiosity. By that her seed has been saved from my wrath; for I also am curious; and I have waited always to see what they will do tomorrow.

When the master has come to do everything through the slave, the slave becomes his master, since he cannot live without him.

Art is the magic mirror you make to reflect your invisible dreams in visible pictures. You use a glass mirror to see your face: you use works of art to see your soul. But we who are older use neither glass mirrors nor works of art. We have a direct sense of life. When you gain that you will put aside your mirrors and statues, your toys and your dolls.

Life is not meant to be easy, my child but take courage: it can be delightful.

Love is a simple thing and a deep thing: it is an act of life and not an illusion. Art is an illusion.

: When a thing is funny, search it for a hidden truth: Yes; and take all the fun out of it.

In truth, mankind cannot be saved from without, by schoolmasters or any other sort of masters: it can only be lamed and enslaved by them. It is said that if you wash a cat it will never again wash itself. This may or may not be true: what is certain is that if you teach a man anything he will never learn it; and if you cure him of a disease he will be unable to cure himself the next time it attacks him.

Any sort of plain speaking is better than the nauseous sham good fellowship our democratic public men get up for shop use.

Conceive. That is the word that means both the beginning in imagination and the end in creation.

Your father is a fool skin deep; but you are a fool to your very marrow.

I enjoy convalescence. It is the part that makes illness worth while.

Life must not cease. That comes before everything. It is silly to say you do not care. You do care. It is that care that will prompt your imagination; inflame your desires; make your will irresistible; and create out of nothing.