Quotes from work

Literary Lapses

“I detest life-insurance agents: they always argue that I shall some day die, which is not so.”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

Insurance up to Date
Literary Lapses (1910)

“It takes a good deal of physical courage to ride a horse. This, however, I have. I get it at about forty cents a flask, and take it as required.”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

Reflections on Riding
Literary Lapses (1910)

“The rushing of his spirit from its prison-house was as rapid as a hunted cat passing over a garden fence.”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

Literary Lapses (1910)

“You know, many a man realizes late in life that if when he was a boy he had known what he knows now, instead of being what he is he might be what he won't; but how few boys stop to think that if they knew what they don't know instead of being what they will be, they wouldn't be?”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

How to Make a Million Dollars
Literary Lapses (1910)

“You frequently ask, where are the friends of your childhood, and urge that they shall be brought back to you. As far as I am able to learn, those of your friends who are not in jail are still right there in your native village. You point out that they were wont to share your gambols, If so, you are certainly entitled to have theirs now.”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

The Poet Answered
Literary Lapses (1910)

“A barber is by nature and inclination a sport. He can tell you at what exact hour the ball game is to begin, can foretell its issue without losing a stroke of the razor, and can explain the points of inferiority of all the players, as compared with the better men that he has personally seen elsewhere, with the nicety of a professional.”

Stephen Leacock Literary Lapses

Men Who Have Shaved Me
Literary Lapses (1910)