Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it. Many will read the book before one thinks of quoting a passage. As soon as he has done this, that line will be quoted east and west. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Quotation and Originality,” Letters and Social Aims, 1876

People who rarely read long books, or even short stories, still appreciate the greatest examples of the shortest literary genres. I have long been fascinated by these short genres. They seem to lie just where my heart is, somewhere between literature and philosophy. – Gary Saul Morson, The Long and Short of It: From Aphorism to Novel, 2012

[T]he governess… looked upon him [Mr. Swiveller] as a literary gentleman of eccentric habits, and of a most prodigious talent in quotation. – Charles Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop, 1841