Quotes

Every day in imagination I made a trip round the world, and I saw many wonders from the uttermost parts of the earth--marvels of invention, treasuries of industry and skill and all the activities of human life actually passed under my finger tips.

The songs of the slave represent the sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its tears.

We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare our pockets.

Let this be thy only joy, and thy only comfort, from one sociable kind action without intermission to pass unto another, God being ever in thy mind.

You must cultivate either your own reason or else externals; apply yourself either to things within or without you—that is, be either a philosopher or one of the mob.

Therefore the sage desires what (other men) do not desire, and does not prize things difficult to get; he learns what (other men) do not learn, and turns back to what the multitude of men have passed by.

The life which men praise and regard as successful is but one kind.

The soul active sees absolute truth and utters truth, or creates.

I have nothing either to hope or fear, and nothing to reproach him with.

The gentle manners and beauty of the cottagers greatly endeared them to me; when they were unhappy, I felt depressed; when they rejoiced, I sympathised in their joys.

The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.

If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.

To speak disrespectfully of love is, I know, high treason against sentiment and fine feelings; but I wish to speak the simple language of truth, and rather to address the head than the heart.

There are many wonderful mixtures in the world which are all alike called love, and claim the privileges of a sublime rage which is an apology for everything (in literature and the drama).

Every few weeks she would shut herself up in her room, put on her scribbling suit, and ‘fall into a vortex’, as she expressed it, writing away at her novel with all her heart and soul, for till that was finished she could find no peace.

All the friends I loved best, except one, have remained my own to the present time.

I have sometimes thought that the mere hearing of those songs would do more to impress some minds with the horrible character of slavery, than the reading of whole volumes of philosophy on the subject could do.

Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul.