There are some composers – at the head of whom stands Beethoven – who not only do not know when to stop but appear to stop many times before they actually do.

When some people retire, it’s going to be mighty hard to be able to tell the difference.

It is not done to let anybody be too happy. The moment two people seem to be enjoying one another’s company, a good hostess introduces a third element or removes the first.

England is the only civilised country in the world where it is etiquette to fall on the food like a wolf the moment it is served. Elsewhere it is comme il faut to wait until everybody has helped himself to everything and until everything on everybody’s plate is stone cold.

Maturity gives us jealous eyes. We look with jealousy on the younger woman because she doesn’t know as much now as we do, and, oh, what we could do with our wisdom and her face.

Say something idiotic and nobody but a dog politely wags his tail.

For a driver to be driven by somebody else is an ordeal, for there are only three types of drivers: the too fast, the timid and oneself.

when we travel, most of us take too much. I always work on the assumption that I'm going to take everything with me because I don't want the second wife to have anything if the plane crashes.

I am a living soap opera.

The women sit, getting colder and colder, on a seat getting harder and harder, watching oafs, getting muddier and muddier.