even those who call themselves 'intimate' know very little about each other - hardly ever know just how a sorrow is felt, and hurt each other by their very attempts at sympathy or consolation. We can bear no hand on our bruises.

Correct English is the slang of prigs.

Pride helps us; and pride is not a bad thing when it only urges us to hide our own hurts—not to hurt others.

It is a very good quality in a man to have a trout-stream.

The law and medicine should be very serious professions to undertake, should they not? People's lives and fortunes depend on them.

It’s rather a strong check to one’s self-complacency to find how much of one’s right doing depends on not being in want of money.

Letter-writing I imagine is counted as 'work' from which you must abstain, and I scribble this letter simply from the self-satisfied notion that you will like to hear from me. You see, I have asked no questions, which are the torture-screws of correspondence. Hence you have nothing to answer.