If he were a man of strong mind, it only gave him fits; but a person of mere average intellect it usually sent mad.

It is always the best policy to speak the truth, unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar.

I like work; it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.

People who have tried it, tell me that a clear conscience makes you very happy and contented; but a full stomach does the business quite as well, and is cheaper, and more easily obtained.

A good woman's arms round a man's neck is a lifebelt thrown out to him from heaven.

Opportunities flit by while we sit regretting the chances we have lost, and the happiness that comes to us we heed not, because of the happiness that is gone.

Love is like the measles; we all have to go through it.

They [dogs] never talk about themselves but listen to you while you talk about yourself, and keep up an appearance of being interested in the conversation.

What I am looking for is a blessing not in disguise.

It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.

If there is one person I do despise more than another, it is the man who does not think exactly the same on all topics as I do.

As a Magnolia, you are always onstage.

She extended a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence.

She knew that she must sit quietly and patiently and, like her beloved butterflies, eventually he would come to rest.

The road to perdition has ever been accompanied by lip service to an ideal.

Infinity has got to become mine so that I can know which way to turn, so that I can know in what direction something like morning is breaking.

That children shall be compelled to receive religious instruction which is in antagonism to the wishes of their parents, is what no man with say sense of justice would suggest.

It seems that most people need to experience a great deal of suffering before they will relinquish resistance and accept - before they will forgive.

I was very disciplined when home - lights out for the girls at 9:00, two hours of writing for me. It was murder on my marriage.

The mind is the soul's eye, not its source of power. That lies in the heart, in other words, in the passions.

I don't care what people think about me because I know I am more than all the pain and strife they hold inside.