It is always incomprehensible to a man that a woman should ever refuse an offer of marriage.

There is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions.

I do regard her as one who is too modest for the world in general to be aware of half her accomplishments, and too highly accomplished for modesty to be natural of any other woman.

Every man is surrounded by a neighborhood of voluntary spies.

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.

Self-knowledge is the first step to maturity.

I have often observed that resignation is never so perfect as when the blessing denied begins to lose somewhat of its value in our eyes.