WIST

You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by. Yes, but some of them are golden only because we let them slip.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
“Courage,” Rectorial Address, St Andrews (1922)

“Why can’t you fly now, mother?”
“Because I am grown up, dearest. When people grow up they forget the way.”
“Why do they forget the way?”
“Because they are no longer gay and innocent and heartless. It is only the gay and innocent and heartless who can fly.”

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Peter & Wendy, ch. 17 (1911)

A safe but sometimes chilly way of recalling the past is to force open a crammed drawer. If you are searching for anything in particular you don’t find it, but something falls out at the back that is often more interesting.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Peter Pan, “To the Five — A Dedication” (1930)

To die will be an awfully big adventure.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Peter Pan, Act III, final sentence (1905)

The following passage was in the 1911 book (ch. 8 "The Mermaid's Lagoon"); the scene was added to the 1905 edition of the play:

Peter was alone on the lagoon.
The rock was very small now; soon it would be submerged. Pale rays of light tiptoed across the waters; and by and by there was to be heard a sound at once the most musical and the most melancholy in the world: the mermaids calling to the moon.
Peter was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last. A tremor ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea; but on the sea one shudder follows another till there are hundreds of them, and Peter felt just the one. Next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him. It was saying, "To die will be an awfully big adventure."

Sometimes quoted as "To die would be an awfully great adventure," "To die will be a great adventure," and "To die would be a great adventure."

The best of our fiction is by novelists who allow that it is as good as they can give, and the worst by novelists who maintain that they could do much better if only the public would let them.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Contemporary Review (1891)

Life is a long lesson in humility.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Little Minister (1891)

If it’s heaven for climate, it’s hell for company.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Little Minister, ch. 3 (1891)
A similar quote is cited to Mark Twain at about the same time. More research into this quotation can be found here.

The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story and writes another, and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Little Minister, I.1 (1891)

Wise children always choose a mother who was a shocking flirt in her maiden days, and so had several offers before she accepted their fortunate papa.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Little White Bird, ch. 22 (1902)

Shall we make a new rule of life from tonight: always to try to be a little kinder than is necessary?

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Little White Bird, ch. 4 (1902)

One’s religion is whatever he is most interested in.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
The Twelve-Pound Look (1910)

Never ascribe to an opponent motives meaner than your own.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Rectorial address, St Andrew’s University (3 May 1922)

It’s not real work unless you would rather be doing something else.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Rectorial address, St. Andrew
Sometimes given as, "Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else."

God gave us our memories so that we might have roses in December.

Sir James Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist
Rectorial address, St. Andrew