lling to pieces, but he considers himself
useful and necessary. The teacher hates him, but he does not notice
it. The harm is great. Once the teacher, unable to stand it any
longer, facing him with anger and disgust, bursts out swearing at him.

* * * * *

_Teacher_: "Poushkin's centenary should not be celebrated; he did
nothing for the church."

* * * * *

Miss Guitarov (actress).

* * * * *

If you wish to become an optimist and understand life, stop believing
what people say and write, observe and discover for yourself.

* * * * *

Husband and wife zealously followed X.'s idea and built up their life
according to it as if it were a formula. Only just before death they
asked themselves: "Perhaps that idea is wrong? Perhaps the saying
'mens sana in corpore sano' is untrue?"

* * * * *

I detest: a playful Jew, a radical Ukrainian, and a drunken German.

* * * * *

The University brings out all abilities, including stupidity.

* * * * *

Taking into consideration, dear sir, as a result of this view, dear
sir....

* * * * *

The most intolerable people are provincial celebrities.

* * * * *

Owing to our flightiness, because the majority of us are unable and
unaccustomed to think or to look deeply into life's phenomena, nowhere
else do people so often say: "How banal!" nowhere else do people
regard so superficially, and often contemptuously other people's
merits or serious questions. On the other hand nowhere else does the
authority of a name weigh so heavily as with us Russians, who have
been abased by centuries of slavery and fear freedom....

* * * * *

A doctor advised a merchant to eat soup and chicken. The merchant
thought the advice ironical. At first he ate a dinner of botvinia and
pork, and then, as if recollecting the doctor's orders, ordered soup
and chicken and swallowed them down too, thinking it a great joke.

* * * * *

Father Epaminond catches fish and puts them in his pocket; then, when
he gets home, he takes out a fish at a time, as he wants it, and fries
it.

* * * * *

The nobleman X. sold his estate to N.