I know the compassion of others is a relief at first. I don't despise it. But it can't quench pain, it slips through your soul as through a sieve. And when our suffering has been dragged from one pity to another, as from one mouth to another, we can no longer respect or love it.

Little things seem nothing, but they give peace, like those meadow flowers which individually seem odorless but all together perfume the air.

What does it matter, all is grace.

It is the perpetual dread of fear, the fear of fear, that shapes the face of a brave man.

Justice in the hands of the powerful is merely a governing system like any other. Why call it justice?

But I shall give less thought to the future, I shall work in the present. I feel such work is within my power. For I only succeed in small things, and when I am tried by anxiety, I am bound to say it is the small joys that release me.

Optimism approves of everything, submits to everything, believes everything; it is the virtue above all of the taxpayer.