Are you hero enough to unite yourself to one whom you know to be suspected and despised by all around you, and identify your interests and your honor with hers?

No, thank you, I don't mind the rain,' I said. I always lacked common sense when taken by surprise.

To regret the exchange of earthly pleasures for the joys of Heaven, is as if the grovelling caterpillar should lament that it must one day quit the nibbled leaf to soar aloft and flutter through the air, roving at will from flower to flower, sipping sweet honey from their cups, or basking in their sunny petals.

All our talents increase in the using, and every faculty, both good and bad, strengthens by exercise.

I love the silent hour of night, for blissful dreams may then arise, revealing to my charmed sight what may not bless my waking eyes.

There are great books in this world and great worlds in books.

A little girl loves her bird--Why? Because it lives and feels; because it is helpless and harmless? A toad, likewise, lives and feels, and is equally helpless and harmless; but though she would not hurt a toad, she cannot love it like the bird, with its graceful form, soft feathers, and bright, speaking eyes.