She will never submit to any thing requiring industry and patience, and a subjection of the fancy to the understanding.

A mind lively and at ease, can do with seeing nothing, and can see nothing that does not answer.

What praise is more valuable than the praise of an intelligent servant?

From politics it was an easy step to silence.

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

She was heartily ashamed of her ignorance - a misplaced shame. Where people wish to attach, they should always be ignorant. To come with a well−informed mind is to come with an inability of administering to the vanity of others, which a sensible person would always wish to avoid. A woman especially, if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can.

It was a gloomy prospect, and all that she could do was to throw a mist over it, and hope when the mist cleared away, she should see something else.