Max Beerbohm Quotes

You cannot make a man by standing a sheep on its hind-legs. But by standing a whole flock of sheep in that position you can make a crowd of men. If man were not a gregarious animal, the world might have achieved, by this time, some real progress towards civilization. Segregate him, and he is no fool. But let him loose among his fellows, and he is lost —- he becomes a unit in unreason.

All fantasy should have a solid base in reality.

As a teacher, as a propagandist, Shaw is no good at all, even in his own generation. But as a personality, he is immortal.

Men of genius are not quick judges of character. Deep thinking and high imagining blunt that trivial instinct by which you and I size people up.

To give an accurate and exhaustive account of that period would need a far less brilliant pen than mine.

Lift latch, step in, be welcome, Sir,
Albeit to see you I’m unglad.

He heard that whenever a woman was to blame for a disappointment, the best way to avoid a scene was to inculpate oneself.

It seems to be a law of nature that no man, unless he has some obvious physical deformity, ever is loth to sit for his portrait.

Oxford walls have a way of belittling us; and the Duke was loath to regard his doom as trivial. Aye, by all minerals we are mocked. Vegetables, yearly deciduous, are far more sympathetic.

Most women are not so young as they are painted.

The dullard's envy of brilliant men is always assuaged by the suspicion that they will come to a bad end.

To say that a man is vain means merely that he is pleased with the effect he produces on other people. A conceited man is satisfied with the effect he produces on himself.

She was one of those people who say "I don't know anything about music really, but I know what I like."

He was too much concerned with his own perfection ever to think of admiring any one else.

The most perfect caricature is that which, on a small surface, with the simplest means, most accurately exaggerates, to the highest point, the peculiarities of a human being, at his most characteristic moment in the most beautiful manner.