There is nothing worse for mortals than a wandering life.

The traveler was active; he went strenuously in search of people, of adventure, of experience. The tourist is passive; he expects interesting things to happen to him. He goes “sightseeing.”

It is delightful to read on the spot the impressions and opinions of tourists who visited a hundred years ago, in the vehicles and with the aesthetic prejudices of the period, the places which you are visiting now. The voyage ceases to be a mere tour through space; you travel through time and thought as well.

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.

See one promontory (said Socrates of old), one mountain, one sea, one river, and see all.

Traveling is like flirting with life. It’s like saying, “I would stay here and love you, but I have to go; this is my station.”

The soul of a journey is liberty, perfect liberty, to think, feel, do just as one pleases. We go on a journey chiefly to be free of all impediments and of all inconveniences—to leave ourselves behind, much more to get rid of others.

When a traveler returneth home, let him not leave the countries where he hath traveled altogether behind him.

Traveling is the ruin of all happiness! There’s no looking at a building here after seeing Italy.

I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list.

According to the law of custom, and perhaps of reason, foreign travel completes the education of an English gentleman.

Travel is like adultery: one is always tempted to be unfaithful to one’s own country. To have imagination is inevitably to be dissatisfied with where you live.

A traveler’s chief aim should be to make men wiser and better, and to improve their minds by the bad—as well as good—example of what they deliver concerning foreign places.