Surely it is one of the requisites of a tasteful garb that the expression of effort to please shall be wanting in it; that the mysteries of the toilet shall not be suggested by it; that the steps to its completion shall be knocked away like the sculptor's ladder from the statue, and the mental force expended upon it be swept away out of sight like the chips on the studio floor.

Truth, like climate, is common property.

... when one reflects on the books one never has written, and never may, though their schedules lie in the beautiful chirography which marks the inception of an unexpressed thought upon the pages of one's notebook, one is aware, of any given idea, that the chances are against its ever being offered to one's dearest readers.

What an immense power over life is the power of possessing distinct aims.

Imagination is built upon knowledge.

Death is not the worst sorrow.

It is not the straining for great things that is most effective; it is the doing the little things, the common duties, a little better and better.