I . . . am always half afraid of finding a clever novel too clever--& of finding my own story & my own people all forestalled.

I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like

Where love is there is no labor; and if there be labor, that labor is loved.

He had an affectionate heart. He must love somebody.

Angry people are not always wise.

I never wish to offend, but I am so foolishly shy, that I often seem negligent, when I am only kept back by my natural awkwardness ... Shyness is only the effect of a sense of inferiority in some way or other. If I could persuade myself that my manners were perfectly easy and graceful, I should not be shy.

To flatter and follow others, without being flattered and followed in turn, is but a state of half enjoyment.