I believe I know the only cure, which is to make one’s center of life inside of one’s self, not selfishly or excludingly, but with a kind of unassailable serenity—to decorate one’s inner house so richly that one is content there, glad to welcome anyone who wants to come and stay, but happy all the same when one is inevitably alone.

In any really good subject, one has only to probe deep enough to come to tears.

To know when to be generous and when firm—that is wisdom.

She had no tolerance for scenes which were not of her own making.

I despair of the Republic! Such dreariness, such whining sallow women, such utter absence of the amenities, such crass food, crass manners, crass landscape!! What a horror it is for a whole nation to be developing without the sense of beauty, and eating bananas for breakfast.

It was harder to drown at sunrise than in darkness.

To be able to look life in the face: that's worth living in a garret for, isn't it?