True happiness, we are told, consists in getting out of one’s self; but the point is not only to get out — you must stay out; and to stay out you must have some absorbing errand.
~ Henry James

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Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.
~ Henry James

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Summer afternoon — summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.
~ Henry James

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If I were to live my life over again, I would be an American. I would steep myself in America, I would know no other land.
~ Henry James

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A tradition is kept alive only by something being added to it.
~ Henry James

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There are two kinds of taste in the appreciation of imaginative literature: the taste for emotions of surprise and the taste for emotions of recognition.
~ Henry James

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Though there are some disagreeable things in Venice there is nothing so disagreeable as the visitors.
~ Henry James

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There are bad manners everywhere, but an aristocracy is bad manners organized.
~ Henry James

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Deep experience is never peaceful.
~ Henry James

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It’s a complex fate, being an American, and one of the responsibilities it entails is fighting against a superstitious valuation of Europe.
~ Henry James

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