It is a sad weakness in us, after all, that the thought of a man's death hallows him anew to us; as if life were not sacred too.

What moments of despair that life would ever be made precious to me by the consciousness that I lived to some good purpose! It was that sort of despair that sucked away the sap of half the hours which might have been filled by energetic youthful activity: and the same demon tries to get hold of me again whenever an old work is dismissed and a new one is being meditated.

I couldn't live in peace if I put the shadow of a willful sin between myself and God.

Character is not cut in marble - it is not something solid and unalterable. It is something living and changing, and may become diseased as our bodies do.

There is a great deal of unmapped country within us which would have to be taken into account in an explanation of our gusts and storms.

The egoism which enters into our theories does not affect their sincerity; rather, the more our egoism is satisfied, the more robust is our belief.

All the learnin' my father ever paid for was a bit o' birch at one end and the alphabet at th ' other.