Sorrows gather around great souls as storms do around mountains; but, like them, they break the storm and purify the air of the plain beneath them.

Woman and men of retiring timidity are cowardly only in dangers which affect themselves, but the first to rescue when others are in danger.

Art is indeed not the bread but the wine of life.

In science the new is an advance; but in morals, as contradicting our inner ideals and historic idols, it is ever a retrogression.

How narrow our souls become when absorbed in any present good or ill! It is only the thought of the future that makes them great.

It has been jestingly said that the works of John Paul Richter are almost unintelligible to any but the Germans, and even to some of them. A worthy German, just before Richter's death, edited a complete edition of his works, in which one particular passage fairly puzzled him. Determined to have it explained at the source, he went to John Paul himself. The author's reply was very characteristic: "My good friend, when I wrote that passage, God and I knew what it meant; it is possible that God knows it still; but as for me, I have totally forgotten."

A variety of nothing is superior to a monotony of something.