I hold it a blasphemy to say that a man ought not to fight against authority: there is no great religion and no great freedom that has not done it, in the beginning.

In the days when the spinning wheels hummed busily in the farmhouses--and even great ladies, clothed in silk and thread lace, had their toy spinning wheels of polished oak--there might be seen, in districts far away among the lanes, or deep in the bosom of the hills, certain palled undersized men who, by the side of the brawny country-folk, looked like the remnants of a disinherited race.

Excellence encourages one about life generally; it shows the spiritual wealth of the world.

There's no disappointment in memory, and one's exaggerations are always on the good side.

A peasant can no more help believing in a traditional superstition than a horse can help trembling when be sees a camel.

For character too is a process and an unfolding. . . among our valued friends is there not someone or other who is a little too self confident and disdainful. . . .

Death was not to be a leap: it was to be a long descent under thickening shadows.