71 Quotes By Robert Louis Stevenson


Talk is by far the most accessible of pleasures. It costs nothing in money, it is all profit, it completes our education, founds and fosters our friendships, and can be enjoyed at any age and in almost any state of health.
Robert Louis Stevenson on age

Man is a creature who lives not upon bread alone, but primarily by catchwords.
Robert Louis Stevenson on alone

The web, then, or the pattern, a web at once sensuous and logical, an elegant and pregnant texture: that is style, that is the foundation of the art of literature.
Robert Louis Stevenson on art

It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men's hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air that emanation from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit.
Robert Louis Stevenson on beauty

We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.
Robert Louis Stevenson on best

Compromise is the best and cheapest lawyer.
Robert Louis Stevenson on best

Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
Robert Louis Stevenson on business

Perpetual devotion to what a man calls his business is only to be sustained by perpetual neglect of many other things.
Robert Louis Stevenson on business

There is no progress whatever. Everything is just the same as it was thousands, and tens of thousands, of years ago. The outward form changes. The essence does not change.
Robert Louis Stevenson on change

Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind, spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies.
Robert Louis Stevenson on courage

Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.
Robert Louis Stevenson on courage

Talk is by far the most accessible of pleasures. It costs nothing in money, it is all profit, it completes our education, founds and fosters our friendships, and can be enjoyed at any age and in almost any state of health.
Robert Louis Stevenson on education

Marriage: A friendship recognized by the police.
Robert Louis Stevenson on friendship

It is a golden maxim to cultivate the garden for the nose, and the eyes will take care of themselves.
Robert Louis Stevenson on gardening

There is only one difference between a long life and a good dinner: that, in the dinner, the sweets come last.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good

Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good

Absences are a good influence in love and keep it bright and delicate.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good

Books are good enough in their own way, but they are a poor substitute for life.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good

Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good

It is the mark of a good action that it appears inevitable in retrospect.
Robert Louis Stevenson on good