Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents," grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. "It's so dreadful to be poor!" sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress. "I don't think it's fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all," added little Amy, with an injured sniff. "We've got Father and Mother, and each other," said Beth contentedly from her corner.

Jo began to dance a jig,...Amy nearly fell out of the window in her surprise, and Meg exclaimed, with uplifted hands, 'Well I do believe the world is coming to an end!

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

…I can't help seeing that you are very lonely, and sometimes there is a hungry look in your eyes that goes to my heart.

The patience and the humility of the face she loved so well was a better lesson to Jo than the wisest lecture, the sharpest reproof.

I went [to war] because I couldn't help it. I didn't want the glory or the pay; I wanted the right thing done.

...Meg learned to love her husband better for his poverty, because it seem to have made a man of him, giving him the strength and courage to fight his own way, and taught him a tender patience with which to bear and comfort the natural longings and failures of those he loved.