Quotes by Bernard De Voto

“Pessimism is only the name that men of weak nerves give to wisdom”

“I dont consider myself a pessimist. I think of a pessimist as someone who is waiting for it to rain. And I feel soaked to the skin.”

“Pessimism is, in brief, playing the sure game. You cannot lose at it; you may gain. It is the only view of life in which you can never be disappointed. Having reckoned what to do in the worst possible circumstances, when better arise, as they may, life becomes childs play.”

“The man who is a pessimist before forty-eight knows too much; if he is an optimist after it he knows too little”

“A pessimist is never disappointed.”

“A pessimist is one who feels bad when he feels good for fear hell feel worse when he feels better.”

“The rat stops gnawing in the wood, the dungeon walls withdraw, the weight is lifted your pulse steadies and the sun has found your heart, the day was not bad, the season has not been bad, there is sense and even promise in going on.”

“The mind has its own logic but does not often let others in on it”

“The proper union of gin and vermouth is a great and sudden glory; it is one of the happiest marriages on earth, and one of the shortest lived.”