The value of books is proportionate to what may be called their plasticity -- their quality of being all things to all men, of being diversely moulded by the impact of fresh forms of thought.

But after a moment a sense of waste and ruin overcame him. There they were, close together and safe and shut in; yet so chained to their separate destinies that they might as well been half the world apart.

One can remain alive ... if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity interested in big things and happy in small ways.

I feel as if I could trust my happiness to carry me; as if it had grown out of me like wings.

Habit is necessary; it is the habit of having habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive.

People struggled on for years with 'troubles,' but they almost always succumbed to 'complications.

Nothing is more perplexing to a man than the mental process of a woman who reasons her emotions.