... I have always been a disappointment to my friends. I have no gift of talk, not much to say; and though I have always been an excellent listener, that only succeeds under auspicious circumstances.

Next to happiness, perhaps enmity is the most healthful stimulant of the human mind.

Married people do stand up so for each other when you say a word, however they may fight between themselves.

Oh, never mind the fashion. When one has a style of one's own, it is always twenty times better.

... up to this date, I have never been shut up in a separate room, or hedged off with any observances. My study, all the study I have attained to, is the little 2nd drawing room where all the (feminine) life of the house goes on; and I don't think I have ever had two hours undisturbed (except at night, when everybody is in bed) during my whole literary life.

There is nothing so costly as bargains.

Against the long years when family bonds make up all that is happiest in life, there must always be reckoned those moments of agitation and revolution, during which the bosom of a family is the most unrestful and disturbing place in existence.