Adventure is not outside man; it is within.

We must find our duties in what comes to us, not in what might have been.

If we need a true conception of the popular character to guide our sympathies rightly, we need it equally to check our theories, and direct us in their application.

We have had an unspeakably delightful journey, one of those journeys which seem to divide one's life in two, by the new ideas they suggest and the new views of interest they open.

Speech is often barren; but silence also does not necessarily brood over a full nest. Your still fowl, blinking at you without remark, may all the while be sitting on one addled egg; and when it takes to cackling will have nothing to announce but that addled delusion.

Receptiveness is a rare and massive power, like fortitude.

Hostesses who entertain much must make up their parties as ministers make up their cabinets, on grounds other than personal liking.