Work is not always required. There is such a thing as sacred idleness.

It is the heart that is not sure of its God that is afraid to laugh in His presence.

Common people, whether lords or shop-keepers, are slow to understand that possession, whether in the shape of birth or lands or money or intellect, is a small affair in the difference between men.

As in all sweetest music, a tinge of sadness was in every note. Nor do we know how much of the pleasures even of life we owe to the intermingled sorrows. Joy cannot unfold the deepest truths, although deepest truth must be deepest joy.

Only he knew that to be left alone is not always to be forsaken.

...it is so silly of people to fancy that old age means crookedness and witheredness and feebleness and sticks and spectacles and rheumatism and forgetfulness! It is so silly! Old age has nothing whatever to do with all that. The right old age means strength and beauty and mirth and courage and clear eyes and strong painless limbs.

People must believe what they can, and those who believe more must not be hard upon those who believe less. I doubt if you would have believed it all yourself if you hadn't seen some of it.