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To spendthrifts money is so living and actual—it is such a thin veil between them and their pleasures! There is only one limit to their fortune—that of time; and a spendthrift with only a few crowns is the Emperor of Rome until they are spent. For such a person to lose his money is to suffer the most shocking reverse, and fall from heaven to hell, from all to nothing, in a breath.

— Robert Louis Stevenson The New Arabian Nights (1882)

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More quotes by Robert Louis Stevenson

The true wisdom is to be always seasonable, and to change with a good grace in changing circumstances.

Virginibus Puerisque and Other Papers (1881)

In every part and corner of our life, to lose oneself is to be a gainer; to forget oneself is to be happy.

Old Mortality (1884)

Books are good enough in their own way, but they are a mighty bloodless substitute for life.

Virginibus Puerisque and Other Papers (1881)

To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.

Familiar Studies of Men and Books (1882)

Our business in this world is not to succeed, but to continue to fail, in good spirits.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Robert Louis Stevenson (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.