Let men tremble to win the hand of woman, unless they win along with it the utmost passion of her heart! Else it may be their miserable fortune, when some mightier touch than their own may have awakened all her sensibilities, to be reproached even for the calm content, the marble image of happiness, which they will have imposed upon her as the warm reality.

I sometimes fancy," said Hilda, on whose susceptibility the scene always made a strong impression, "that Rome--mere Rome--will crowd everything else out of my heart.

You can get assent to almost any proposition so long as you are not going to do anything about it.

What, in the name of common-sense, had I to do with any better society than I had always lived in?

It is a good lesson - though it may often be a hard one - for a man... to step aside out of the narrow circle in which his claims are recognized, and to find how utterly devoid of significance, beyond that circle, is all that he achieves, and all he aims at.

As the moral gloom of the world overpowers all systematic gaiety, even so was their home of wild mirth made desolate amid the sad forest.

Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind.