A friend is one to whom one may pour out the contents of one's heart, chaff and grain together, knowing that gentle hands will take and sift it, keep what is worth keeping, and with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away.

If we only look far enough off for the consequence of our actions, we can always find some point in the combination of results by which those actions can be justified: by adopting the point of view of a Providence who arranges results, or of a philosopher who traces them, we shall find it possible to obtain perfect complacency in choosing to do what is most agreeable to us in the present moment.

It so often happens that others are measuring us by our past self while we are looking back on that self with a mixture of disgust and sorrow.

In the ages since Adam's marriage, it has been good for some men to be alone, and for some women also.

We judge other according to results; how else?--not knowing the process by which results are arrived at.

Among all forms of mistake, prophecy is the most gratuitous.

Sane people did what their neighbors did, so that if any lunatics were at large, one might know and avoid them.