Great Throughts Treasury

"I believe the root of all happiness on this earth to life in the realization of a spiritual life with a consciousness of something wider than materialism; in the capacity to live in a world that makes you unselfish because you are not over anxious about your personal place; that makes you tolerant because you realize your own comic fallibility; that gives you tranquillity without complacency because you believe in something so much larger than yourself."

"It isn't life that matters; it's the courage you bring to it."

"Don't play for safety - it's the most dangerous thing in the world."

"This world is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel."

"In all science error precedes the truth, and it is better it should go first than last."

"Foolish writers and readers are created for each other."

"Men are often capable of greater things than they perform. They are sent into the world with bills of credit, and seldom draw to their full extent."

"Happiness comes from within a man, from some curious adjustment to life."

"All paraphrases and expletives are so much in disuse that soon the only way of making love will be to say, Lie down."

"I believe it then to be quite simply true that books have their own very personal feeling about their place on the shelves. They like to be close to suitable companions, and I remember once on coming into my library that I was persistently disturbed by my ‘Jane Eyre’. Going up to it, wondering what was the matter with it, restless because of it, I only after a morning’s uneasiness discovered that it had been placed next to my Jane Austen’s, and anyone who remembers how sharply Charlotte criticized Jane will understand why this would never do."

"The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and a thousand other things well."

"Tisn't life that matters! 'Tis the courage you bring to it."

"My hatred of revision and my twist towards abnormality spoil much of my work."

"The happiest people I have known in this world have been the Saints-and, after these, the men and women who get immediate and conscious enjoyment from little things."

"Over this country, when the giant Eagle flings the shadow of his wing, the land is darkened. So compact is it that the wing covers all its extent in one pause of the flight. The sea breaks on the pale line of the shore; to the Eagle's proud glance waves run in to the foot of the hills that are like rocks planted in green water."

"The most wonderful of all things in life is the discovery of another human being with whom one's relationship has a growing depth, beauty and joy as the years increase. This inner progressiveness of love between two human beings is a most marvelous thing; it cannot be found by looking for it or by passionately wishing for it. It is a sort of divine accident, and the most wonderful of all things in life."