What makes old age so sad is, not that our joys, but that our hopes then cease.

He thought of the mouldering child, which laid its withered thin arms around his soul, as if it were his own, and to whom Death had given as much as a god gave to Endymion, — sleep, eternal youth, and immortality.

In later life, as in earlier, only a few persons influence the formation of our character; the multitude pass us by like a distant army. One friend, one teacher, one beloved, one club, one dining table, one work table are the means by which one's nation and the spirit of one's nation affect the individual.

It is simpler and easier to flatter people than to praise them.

There are souls in this world which have the gift of finding joy everywhere and of leaving it behind them when they go.

There are souls which fall from heaven like flowers, but ere they bloom are crushed under the foul tread of some brutal hoof.

Romanticism is beauty without bounds-the beautiful infinite.