She believed in letting children have a certain amount of rope, and only intervened at the last moment, in order to prevent their hanging themselves by it.

I am never at picnics. The ground was not meant to be sat upon in its raw state, I feel sure, and I prefer my food without either caterpillars or drafts!

When we refuse to accept our limitations, Nature, who is a stern realist, pays us out.

it is the possibilities which are the most terrible things in life.

Curiosity is the only thing that really carries through time, isn't it? The creative curiosity, I mean, which fights its way into expression?

The two best subjects for conversation are talking shop and making love.

all daughters, even when most aggravated by their mothers, have a secret respect for them. They believe perhaps that they can do everything better than their mothers can, and many things they can do better, but they have not yet lived long enough to be sure how successfully they will meet the major emergencies of life, which lie, sometimes quite creditably, behind their mothers.