O. Henry Quotes and Quotation

(pen name of William Sydney Porter) (1862-1910)

• What is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it?
  • Cabbages and Kings (1904)

• Not very long ago some one invented the assertion that there were only "Four Hundred" people in New York City who were really worth noticing. But a wiser man has arisen —the census taker —and his larger estimate of human interest has been preferred in marking out the field of these little stories of the "Four Million."
  • Preface, The Four Million (1906)

• One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.
  • The Gift of the Magi (1906) The Four Million

• There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.
  • The Gift of the Magi (1906) The Four Million

• The magi, as you know, were wise men —wonderfully wise men —who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.
  • The Gift of the Magi (1906) The Four Million

• Man is too thoroughly an egoist not to be also an egotist; if he love, the object shall know it. During a lifetime he may conceal it through stress of expediency and honour, but it shall bubble from his dying lips, though it disrupt a neighbourhood. It is known, however, that most men do not wait so long to disclose their passion. In the case of Lorison, his particular ethics positively forbade him to declare his sentiments, but he must needs dally with the subject, and woo by innuendo at least.
  • Blind Man's Holiday

• History is bright and fiction dull with homely men who have charmed women.
  • Next to Reading Matter (1909) Roads of Destiny

• "Turn up the lights —I don't want to go home in the dark."
  • Last words, June 5, 1910

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