1.
If letters did not exist, what dark depressions would come over one! When one has been worrying about something and wants to tell a certain person about it, what a relief it is to put it all down in a letter! Still greater is one's joy when a reply arrives. At that moment a letter really seems like an elixir of life.
Sei Shonagon
2.
In life there are two things which are dependable. The pleasures of the flesh and the pleasures of literature.
Sei Shonagon
3.
A man who has nothing in particular to recommend him discusses all sorts of subjects at random as if he knew everything.
Sei Shonagon
4.
There is nothing in the whole world so painful as feeling that one is not liked.
Sei Shonagon
5.
One is telling a story about old times when someone breaks in with a little detail that he happens to know, implying that one's own version is inaccurate — disgusting behavior!
Sei Shonagon
6.
Pleasing things: finding a large number of tales that one has not read before. Or acquiring the second volume of a tale whose first volume one has enjoyed. But often it is a disappointment.
Sei Shonagon
7.
A good lover will behave just as elegantly at dawn as at any other time.
Sei Shonagon
8.
If someone with whom one is having an affair keeps on mentioning some woman whom he knew in the past, however long ago it is since they separated, one is always irritated.
Sei Shonagon
9.
To wash one's hair, make one's toilet, and put on scented robes; even if not a soul sees one, these preparations still produce an inner pleasure.
Sei Shonagon