In reading some books we occupy ourselves chiefly with the thoughts of the author; in perusing others, exclusively with our own.

If you wish to forget anything on the spot, make a note that this thing is to be remembered.

Beauty is the sole legitimate province of the poem.

If we cannot comprehend God in his visible works, how then in his inconceivable thoughts, that call the works into being?

I would define, in brief, the Poetry of words as the Rhythmical Creation of Beauty. Its sole arbiter is taste. With the intellect or with the conscience, it has only collateral relations. Unless incidentally, it has no concern whatever either with duty or with truth.

There are few persons who have not, at some period of their lives, amused themselves in retracing the steps by which particular conclusions of their own minds have been attained. The occupation is often full of interest and he who attempts it for the first time is astonished by the apparently illimitable distance and incoherence between the starting-point and the goal.

Many years ago, I contracted an intimacy with a Mr. William Legrand. He was of an ancient Huguenot family, and had once been wealthy; but a series of misfortunes had reduced him to want.