One only "right" we have to assert in common with mankind--and that is as much in our hands as theirs--is the right of having something to do.

we are so scornful when we are young!

Why cannot one always do, not only the right thing, but at the right time?

Though it is folly to suppose that happiness is a matter of volition, and that we can make ourselves content and cheerful whenever we choose - a theory that many poor hypochondriacs are taunted with till they are nigh driven mad - yet, on the other hand, no sane mind is ever left without the power of self-discipline and self-control in a measure, which measure increases in proportion as it is exercised.

Unless a woman has a decided pleasure and facility in teaching, an honest knowledge of everything she professes to impart, a liking for children, and, above all, a strong moral sense of her responsibility towards them, for her to attempt to enroll herself in the scholastic order is absolute profanation.

We have not to construct human nature afresh, but to take it as we find it, and make the best of it.

Society, in the aggregate, is no fool. It is astonishing what an amount of "eccentricity" it will stand from anybody who takes the bull by the horns, too fearless or too indifferent to think of consequences.