Chess-players are so unsociable, they are no company for any but themselves.

In love affairs, there is no mediator like a merry, simple-hearted child - ever ready to cement divided hearts, to span the unfriendly gulf of custom, to melt the ice of cold reserve, and overthrow the separating walls of dread formality and pride.

He never could have loved me, or he would not have resigned me so willingly

My cup of sweets is not unmingled: it is dashed with a bitterness that I cannot hide from myself, disguise it as I will.

You might as well sell yourself to slavery at once, as marry man you dislike.

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

I see that a man cannot give himself up to drinking without being miserable one half his days and mad the other; besides, I like to enjoy my life at all sides and ends, which cannot be done by one that suffers himself to be the slave of a single propensity.