But, ah me! where is the faultless human creature who can persevere in a good resolution, without sometimes failing and falling back?

The fool's crime is the crime that is found out and the wise man's crime is the crime that is not found out.

...it will always remain my private persuasion that Nature was absorbed in making cabbages when Mrs. Vesey was born, and that the good lady suffered the consequences of a vegetable preoccupation in the mind of the Mother of us all.

I used to attend scientific experiments when I was a girl at school. They invariably ended in an explosion. If Mr. Jennings will be so very kind, I should like to be warned of the explosion this time. With a view to getting it over, if possible, before I go to bed.

Pedants, who have the least knowledge to be proud of, are impelled most by vanity.

No sensible man ever engages, unprepared, in a fencing match of words with a woman.

I never paid you a compliment, Rachel, in my life. Successful love may sometimes use the language of flattery, I admit. But hopeless love, dearest, always speaks the truth.