All art is but dirtying the paper delicately.

It is strange that of all the pieces of the Bible which my mother taught me, that which cost me the most to learn, and which was to my childish mind the most repulsive - Psalm 119 - has now become of all the most precious to me in its overflowing and glorious passion of love for the Law of God.

Large fortunes are all founded either on the occupation of land, or lending or the taxation of labor.

All things are literally better, lovelier, and more beloved for the imperfections which have been divinely appointed, that the law of human life may be effort, and the law of human judgment, mercy.

Without mountains the air could not be purified, nor the flowing of the rivers sustained.

Will you not covet such power as this, and seek such throne as this, and be no more housewives, but queens? There is no putting by that crown; queens you must always be; queens to your lovers; queens to your husbands and sons; queens of higher mystery to the world beyond. . . . But alas! you are too often idle and careless queens, grasping at majesty in the least things, while you abdicate it in the greatest.

Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I'll tell you what you are.