It is a wonderful subduer, this need of love-this hunger of the heart-as peremptory as that other hunger by which Nature forces us to submit to the yoke, and change the face of the world.

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

In bed our yesterdays are too oppressive: if a man can only get up, though it be but to whistle or to smoke, he has a present which offers some resistance to the past—sensations which assert themselves against tyrannous memories.

Death is the king of this world: 'Tis his park where he breeds life to feed him. Cries of pain are music for his banquet.

Our virtues are dearer to us the more we have had to suffer for them. It is the same with our children. All profound affection entertains a sacrifice. Our thoughts are often worse than we are, just as they are often better.

It's no use filling your pocket with money if you have got a hole in the corner.

But with regard to critical occasions, it often happens that all moments seem comfortably remote until the last.