They were upon their great theme: "When I get to be a man!" Being human, though boys, they considered their present estate too commonplace to be dwelt upon. So, when the old men gather, they say: "When I was a boy!" It really is the land of nowadays that we never discover.

Booth Tarkington

Categorized in : Boys Men Land

Gossip is never fatal until it is denied.

Booth Tarkington

denied gossip

An ideal wife is any woman who has an ideal husband.

Booth Tarkington

wedding marriage inspirational

Whatever does not pretend at all has style enough.

Booth Tarkington

style personality doe

The only good in pretending is the fun we get out of fooling ourselves that we fool somebody.

Booth Tarkington

pretending fool fun

Destiny has a constant passion for the incongruous.

Booth Tarkington

fate passion destiny

Take your work seriously but never take yourself seriously and do not take what happens either to yourself or your work seriously.

Booth Tarkington

seriousness experience happens

No doubt it is true that there is more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner repented than over all the saints who consistently remain holy, and the rare, sudden gentlenesses of arrogant people have infinitely more effect than the continual gentleness of gentle people. Arrogance turned gentle melts the heart.

Booth Tarkington

heart heaven people

The understanding smile of an old wife to her husband is one of the loveliest things in the world.

Booth Tarkington

wife husband love

It is love in old age, no longer blind, that is true love. For the love's highest intensity doesn't necessarily mean it's highest quality.

Booth Tarkington

quality age mean

Boyhood is the longest time in life for a boy. The last term of the school-year is made of decades, not of weeks, and living through them is like waiting for the millennium.

Booth Tarkington

boys years school

Arguments only confirm people in their own opinions.

Booth Tarkington

opinion arguing people

I'm not so sure he's wrong about automobiles," he said, "With all their speed forward they may be a step backward for civilization-that is, spiritual civilization ... But automobiles have come, and they bring a greater change in our life than most of us expect. They are here, and almost all outward things are going to be different because of what they bring. They are going to alter war, and they are going to alter peace.

Booth Tarkington

change spiritual war

Gossip is never fatal until it is denied. Gossip goes on about every human being alive and about all the dead that are alive enough to be remembered, and yet almost never does any harm until some defender makes a controversy. Gossip's a nasty thing, but it's sickly, and if people of good intentions will let it entirely alone, it will die, ninety-nine times out of a hundred.

Booth Tarkington

ninety-nine gossip people

The things that we have and that we think are so solid - they're like smoke, and time is like the sky that the smoke disappears into, nothing is left but the sky, and the sky keeps on being just the same forever.

Booth Tarkington

spiritual sky thinking

Mystics always hope that science will some day overtake them.

Booth Tarkington

science

Superciliousness is not safe after all, because a person who forms the habit of wearing it may some day find his lower lip grown permanently projected beyond the upper, so that he can't get it back, and must go through life looking like the King of Spain.

Booth Tarkington

spain kings book

My theory on literature is an author who does not indulge in trashiness-writes about people you could introduce into your own home...he did not care to read a book or go to a play about people he would not care to meet at his own dinner table. I believe we should live by certain standards and ideals.

Booth Tarkington

home believe book

There aren't any old times. When times are gone they're not old, they're dead! There aren't any times but new times!

Booth Tarkington

old-time gone

Nobody has a good name in a bad mouth. Nobody has a good name in a silly mouth either.

Booth Tarkington

mouths names silly

Some day the laws of glamour must be discovered, because they are so important that the world would be wiser now if Sir Isaac Newton had been hit on the head, not by an apple, but by a young lady.

Booth Tarkington

apples important law