Do not try to push your way through to the front ranks of your profession do not run after distinctions and rewards but do your utmost to find an entry into the world of beauty. – Sydney Smith
A comfortable house is a great source of happiness. It ranks immediately after health and a good conscience. – Sydney Smith
The observances of the church concerning feasts and fasts are tolerably well-kept, since the rich keep the feasts and the poor keep the fasts. – Sydney Smith
Life is to be fortified by many friendships. To love and to be loved is the greatest happiness of existence. – Sydney Smith
I hope you have lost your good looks, for while they last any fool can adore you, and the adoration of fools is bad for the soul. No, give me a ruined complexion and a lost figure and sixteen chins on a farmyard of Crow’s feet and an obvious wig. Then you shall see me coming out strong. – George Bernard Shaw, to Mrs. Patrick Campbell