Our desires, once realized, haunt us again less readily.

The soul of the great musician can only be expressed in music.

I fear I have not one good word to say this fair morning, though the sun shines so encouragingly on the distant hills and gentle river and the trees are in their festive hues. I am not festive, though contented. When obliged to give myself to the prose of life, as I am on this occasion of being established in a new home I like to do the thing, wholly and quite, - to weave my web for the day solely from the grey yarn.

A man who means to think and write a great deal must, after six and twenty, learn to read with his fingers.

As to marriage, I think the intercourse of heart and mind may be fully enjoyed without entering into this partnership of daily life.

Man is not made for society, but society is made for man. No institution can be good which does not tend to improve the individual.

The critic is beneath the maker, but is his needed friend. The critic is not a base caviler, but the younger brother of genius. Next to invention is the power of interpreting invention; next to beauty the power of appreciating beauty. And of making others appreciate it.