the mysterious complexity of our life is not to be embraced by maxims ... to lace ourselves up in formulas of that sort is to repress all the divine promptings and inspirations that spring from growing insight and sympathy.

We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it.

Vague memories hang about the mind like cobwebs.

Well, I aren't like a bird-clapper, forced to make a rattle when the wind blows on me. I can keep my own counsel when there's no good i' speaking.

Society never made the preposterous demand that a man should think as much about his own qualifications for making a charming girl happy as he thinks of hers for making himself happy.

We all remember epochs in our experience when some dear expectation dies, or some new motive is born.

There is a great deal of unmapped country within us which would have to be taken into account in an explanation of our gusts and storms.