The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations Preface

That action is best, which procures the greatest happiness for the greatest numbers.
‘An Inquiry into the Original of our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue’ (1725) treatise 2, sect. 3, subsect. 8.
8.164 Aldous Huxley 1894-1963
Christlike in my behaviour,
Like every good believer,
I imitate the Saviour,
And cultivate a beaver.
‘Antic Hay’ (1923) ch. 4
There are few who would not rather be taken in adultery than in provincialism.
‘Antic Hay’ (1923) ch. 10
Official dignity tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the
office is held.
‘Beyond the Mexique Bay’ (1934) p. 34
The sexophones wailed like melodious cats under the moon.
‘Brave New World’ (1932) ch. 5
The proper study of mankind is books.
‘Crome Yellow’ (1921) ch. 28.
Too much consistency is as bad for the mind as it is for the body. Consistency is contrary to
nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead.
‘Do What You Will’ (1929) ‘Wordsworth in the Tropics’
The end cannot justify the means, for the simple and obvious reason that the means employed
determine the nature of the ends produced.
‘Ends and Means’ (1937) ch. 1
So long as men worship the Caesars and Napoleons, Caesars and Napoleons will duly arise and
make them miserable.
‘Ends and Means’ (1937) ch. 8
Chastity—the most unnatural of all the sexual perversions.
‘Eyeless in Gaza’ (1936) ch. 27
I can sympathize with people’s pains, but not with their pleasures. There is something
curiously boring about somebody else’s happiness.
‘Limbo’ (1920) ‘Cynthia’
Several excuses are always less convincing than one.
‘Point Counter Point’ (1928) ch. 1
Brought up in an epoch when ladies apparently rolled along on wheels, Mr Quarles was
peculiarly susceptible to calves.
‘Point Counter Point’ (1928) ch. 20
A million million spermatozoa,
All of them alive:
Out of their cataclysm but one poor Noah