Love has a way of cheating itself consciously, like a child who plays at solitary hide-and-seek; it is pleased with assurances that it all the while disbelieves.

I at least have so much to do in unraveling certain human lots, and seeing how they were woven and interwoven, that all the light I can command must be concentrated on this particular web, and not dispersed over that tempting range of relevancies called the universe.

I should like to know what is the proper function of women, if it is not to make reasons for husbands to stay at home, and still stronger reasons for bachelors to go out.

Many an irritating fault, many an unlovely oddity, has come of a hard sorrow.

A common fallacy: to imagine a measure will be easy because we have private motives for desiring it.

Power of generalizing gives men so much the superiority in mistake over the dumb animals.

To manage men one ought to have a sharp mind in a velvet sheath.