Happy is the son whose faith in his mother remains unchallenged.

John Brooke is acting dreadfully, and Meg likes it!

Watch and pray, dear, never get tired of trying, and never think it is impossible to conquer your fault.

Prove that you understand the worth of time by employing it well.

…for no matter how lost and soiled and worn-out wandering sons may be, mothers can forgive and forget every thing as they fold them into their fostering arms. Happy the son whose faith in his mother remains unchanged, and who, through all his wanderings, has kept some filial token to repay her brave and tender love.

The power of finding beauty in the humblest things makes home happy and life lovely.

For with eyes made clear by many tears, and a heart softened by the tenderest sorrow, she recognized the beauty of her sister's life—uneventful, unambitious, yet full of the genuine virtues which 'smell sweet, and blossom in the dust', the self-forgetfulness that makes the humblest on earth remembered soonest in heaven, the true success which is possible to all.