It is always the best policy to speak the truth, unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar.
There are two kinds of clocks. There is the clock that is always wrong, and that knows it is wrong, and glories in it; and there is the clock that is always right — except when you rely upon it, and then it is more wrong than you would think a clock could be in a civilized country.
— Jerome K. Jerome
Humorous
There are the goods; if you want them, you can have them. If you do not want them, they would almost rather that you did not come and talk about them.
— Jerome K. Jerome
Business
Nothing—so it seems to me...is more beautiful than the love that has weathered the storms of life. … The love of the young for the young, that is the beginning of life. But the love of the old for the old, that is the beginning of—of things longer.
I want a house that has got over all its troubles; I don't want to spend the rest of my life bringing up a young and inexperienced house.
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do. There is no fun in doing nothing when you have nothing to do. Wasting time is merely an occupation then, and a most exhausting one. Idleness, like kisses, to be sweet must be stolen.
I attribute the quarrelsome nature of the Middle Ages young men entirely to the want of the soothing weed.
— Jerome K. Jerome
History
Love is like the measles; we all have to go through it. Also like the measles, we take it only once...No, we never sicken with love twice. Cupid spends no second arrow on the same heart.
A boy's love comes from a full heart; a man's is more often the result of a full stomach. Indeed, a man's sluggish current may not be called love, compared with the rushing fountain that wells up when a boy's heart is struck with the heavenly rod. If you would taste love, drink of the pure stream that youth pours out at your feet. Do not wait till it has become a muddy river before you stoop to catch its waves.