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A Woman's Chastity Consists, Like An Onion, Of A Series Of Coats. You May Strip Off The Outer Ones Without Doing Much Mischief, Perhaps None At All ; But You Keep Taking Off One After Another, In Expectation Of Coming To The Inner Nucleus, Including The Whole Value Of The Matter. It Proves, However, That There Is No Such Nucleus, And That Chastity Is Diffused Through The Whole Series Of Coats, Is Lessened With The Removal Of Each, And Vanishes With The Final One Which You Supposed Would Introduce You To The Hidden Pearl.

-Nathaniel Hawthorne

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A Woman's Chastity Consists,

Nathaniel Hawthorne

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A Woman's Chastity Consists, Like An Onion, Of A Series Of Coats. You May Strip Off The Outer Ones Without Doing Much Mischief, Perhaps None At All ; But You Keep Taking Off One After Another, In Expectation Of Coming To The Inner Nucleus, Including The Whole Value Of The Matter. It Proves, However, That There Is No Such Nucleus, And That Chastity Is Diffused Through The Whole Series Of Coats, Is Lessened With The Removal Of Each, And Vanishes With The Final One Which You Supposed Would Introduce You To The Hidden Pearl.

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Pleasant Is A Rainy Winter's Day, Within Doors! The Best Study For Such A Day, Or The Best Amusement,—call It Which You Will,—is A Book Of Travels, Describing Scenes The Most Unlike That Sombre One

Strength Is Incomprehensible By Weakness, And, Therefore, The More Terrible.

I Find Myself At The Extremity Of A Long Beach. How Gladly Does The Spirit Leap Forth, And Suddenly Enlarge Its Sense Of Being To The Full Extent Of The Broad, Blue, Sunny Deep! A Greeting And A Homage To The Sea! I Descend Over Its Margin, And Dip My Hand Into The Wave That Meets Me, And Bathe My Brow. That Far-resounding Roar Is The Ocean’s Voice Of Welcome. His Salt Breath Brings A Blessing Along With It.

Caresses, Expressions Of One Sort Or Another, Are Necessary To The Life Of The Affections As Leaves Are To The Life Of A Tree. If They Are Wholly Restrained, Love Will Die At The Roots.

Why Are Poets So Apt To Choose Their Mates, Not For Any Similarity Of Poetic Endowment, But For Qualities Which Might Make The Happiness Of The Rudest Handicraftsman As Well As That Of The Ideal Craftsman Of The Spirit? Because, Probably, At His Highest Elevation, The Poet Needs No Human Intercourse; But He Finds It Dreary To Descend, And Be A Stranger.

...and We Have So Far Improved Upon The Custom Of Adam And Eve, That We Generally Furnish Forth Our Feasts With A Portion Of Some Delicate Calf Or Lamb, Whose Unspotted Innocence Entitles Them To The Happiness Of Becoming Our Sustenance.

Do Anything, Save To Lie Down And Die!

Moonlight Is Sculpture.

Yesterday I Visited The British Museum; An Exceedingly Tiresome Affair. It Quite Crushes A Person To See So Much At Once; And I Wandered From Hall To Hall With A Weary And Heavy Heart. The Present Is Burdened Too Much With The Past.

Great Men Need To Be Lifted Upon The Shoulders Of The Whole World, In Order To Conceive Their Great Ideas Or Perform Their Great Deeds. That Is, There Must Be An Atmosphere Of Greatness Round About Them. A Hero Cannot Be A Hero Unless In An Heroic World.

A Human Spirit May Find No Insufficiency Of Food Fit For It, Even In The Custom House.

It Contributes Greatly Towards A Man's Moral And Intellectual Health, To Be Brought Into Habits Of Companionship With Individuals Unlike Himself, Who Care Little For His Pursuits, And Whose Sphere And Abilities He Must Go Out Of Himself To Appreciate.

Life Is Made Up Of Marble And Mud.

What Is The Voice Of Song When The World Lacks The Ear Of Taste?

Words - So Innocent And Powerless As They Are, As Standing In A Dictionary, How Potent For Good And Evil They Become In The Hands Of One Who Knows How To Combine Them.

We Are As Happy As People Can Be, Without Making Themselves Ridiculous, And Might Be Even Happier; But, As A Matter Of Taste, We Choose To Stop Short At This Point.

We Go All Wrong By Too Strenuous A Resolution To Go Right.

It Is Remarkable, That Persons Who Speculate The Most Boldly Often Conform With The Most Perfect Quietude To The External Regulations Of Society. The Thoughts Alone Suffice Them, Without Investing Itself In The Flesh And Blood Of Action.

The Christian Faith Is A Grand Cathedral With Divinely Pictured Windows.

Amid The Seeming Confusion Of Our Mysterious World , Individuals Are So Nicely Adjusted To A System, And Systems To One Another And To A Whole, That, By Stepping Aside For A Moment, A Man Exposes Himself To A Fearful Risk Of Losing His Place Forever. (wakefield)

Be True! Be True! Be True! Show Freely To The World, If Not Your Worst, Yet Some Trait Whereby The Worst May Be Inferred!

But She Named The Infant "pearl," As Being Of Great Price-purchased With All She Had-her Mother's Only Treasure!

Trusting No Man As His Friend, He Could Not Recognize His Enemy When The Latter Actually Appeared.

A Vast Deal Of Human Sympathy Runs Along The Electric Line Of Needlework, Stretching From The Throne To The Wicker Chair Of The Humble Seamstress.

The Washing Of Dishes Does Seem To Me The Most Absurd And Unsatisfactory Business That I Ever Undertook. If, When Once Washed, They Would Remain Clean For Ever And Ever (which They Ought In All Reason To Do, Considering How Much Trouble It Is), There Would Be Less Occasion To Grumble; But No Sooner Is It Done, Than It Requires To Be Done Again. On The Whole, I Have Come To The Resolution Not To Use More Than One Dish At Each Meal.

Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing.

But This Had Been A Sin Of Passion, Not Of Principle, Nor Even Purpose.

I Sometimes Fancy," Said Hilda, On Whose Susceptibility The Scene Always Made A Strong Impression, "that Rome--mere Rome--will Crowd Everything Else Out Of My Heart.

In An Ancient Though Not Very Populous Settlement, In A Retired Corner Of One Of The New England States, Arise The Walls Of A Seminary Of Learning, Which, For The Convenience Of A Name, Shall Be Entitled "harley College.

All Brave Men Love; For He Only Is Brave Who Has Affections To Fight For, Whether In The Daily Battle Of Life, Or In Physical Contests.

When A Writer Calls His Work A Romance, It Need Hardly Be Observed That He Wishes To Claim A Certain Latitude, Both As To Its Fashion And Material, Which He Would Not Have Felt Himself Entitled To Assume Had He Professed To Be Writing A Novel.

All Merely Graceful Attributes Are Usually The Most Evanescent.

A Few Feathery Flakes Are Scattered Widely Through The Air, And Hover Downward With Uncertain Flight, Now Almost Alighting On The Earth, Now Whirled Again Aloft Into Remote Regions Of The Atmosphere.

Mountains Are Earth's Undecaying Monuments.

The Present Is Burdened Too Much With The Past. We Have Not Time, In Our Earthly Existence, To Appreciate What Is Warm With Life, And Immediately Around Us.

Depending Upon One Another's Hearts, Ye Had Still Hoped That Virtue Were Not All A Dream. Now Are Ye Undeceived. Evil Is The Nature Of Mankind.

You Can Get Assent To Almost Any Proposition So Long As You Are Not Going To Do Anything About It.

It Is To The Credit Of Human Nature, That, Except Where Its Selfishness Is Brought Into Play, It Loves More Readily Than It Hates. Hatred, By A Gradual And Quiet Process, Will Even Be Transformed To Love, Unless The Change Be Impeded By A Continually New Irritation Of The Original Feeling Of Hostility.

Inspirational Love

Death Is So Genuine A Fact That It Excludes Falsehoods, Or Betrays Its Emptiness; It Is A Touchstone That Proves The Gold, And Dishonors The Baser Metal.

My Heart Was A Habitation Large Enough For Many Guests, But Lonely And Chill, And Without A Household Fire. I Longed To Kindle One! It Seemed Not So Wild A Dream.

This World Owes All Its Forward Impulses To People Ill At Ease.

If Truth Were Everywhere To Be Shown, A Scarlet Letter Would Blaze Forth On Many A Bosom.

She Poured Out The Liquid Music Of Her Voice To Quench The Thirst Of His Spirit.

Let The Black Flower Blossom As It May!

The Book, If You Would See Anything In It, Requires To Be Read In The Clear, Brown, Twilight Atmosphere In Which It Was Written; If Opened In The Sunshine, It Is Apt To Look Exceedingly Like A Volume Of Blank Pages.

It Is A Curious Subject Of Observation And Inquiry, Whether Hatred And Love Be Not The Same Thing At Bottom. Each, In Its Utmost Development, Supposes A High Degree Of Intimacy And Heart-knowledge; Each Renders One Individual Dependent For The Food Of His Affections And Spiritual Life Upon Another; Each Leaves The Passionate Lover, Or The No Less Passionate Hater, Forlorn And Desolate By The Withdrawal Of His Object.

And What Is More Melancholy Than The Old Apple-trees That Linger About The Spot Where Once Stood A Homestead, But Where There Is Now Only A Ruined Chimney Rising Our Of A Grassy And Weed-grown Cellar? They Offer Their Fruit To Every Wayfarer--apples That Are Bitter-sweet With The Moral Of Times Vicissitude.

Honesty And Wisdom Are Such A Delightful Pastime, At Another Person's Expense!

A Woman's Chastity Consists, Like An Onion, Of A Series Of Coats. You May Strip Off The Outer Ones Without Doing Much Mischief, Perhaps None At All ; But You Keep Taking Off One After Another, In Expectation Of Coming To The Inner Nucleus, Including The Whole Value Of The Matter. It Proves, However, That There Is No Such Nucleus, And That Chastity Is Diffused Through The Whole Series Of Coats, Is Lessened With The Removal Of Each, And Vanishes With The Final One Which You Supposed Would Introduce You To The Hidden Pearl.

When Scattered Clouds Are Resting On The Bosoms Of Hills, It Seems As If One Might Climb Into The Heavenly Region, Earth Being So Intermixed With Sky, And Gradually Transformed Into It.

Let Men Tremble To Win The Hand Of Woman, Unless They Win Along With It The Utmost Passion Of Her Heart!

In This Republican Country, Amid The Fluctuating Waves Of Our Social Life, Somebody Is Always At The Drowning-point.

There Is Great Incongruity In This Idea Of Monuments, Since Those To Whom They Are Usually Dedicated Need No Such Recognition To Embalm Their Memory; And Any Man Who Does, Is Not Worthy Of One.

A Pure Hand Needs No Glove To Cover It.

If Cities Were Built By The Sound Of Music, Then Some Edifices Would Appear To Be Constructed By Grave, Solemn Tones,--others To Have Danced Forth To Light Fantastic Airs.

The Breath Of Peace Was Fanning Her Glorious Brow, Her Head Was Bowed A Very Little Forward, And A Tress, Escaping From Its Bonds, Fell By The Side Of Her Pure White Temple, And Close To Her Just Opened Lips; It Hung There Motionless! No Breath Disturbed Its Repose! She Slept As An Angel Might Sleep, Having Accomplished The Mission Of Her God.

The World Surely Has Not Another Place Like Oxford; It Is A Despair To See Such A Place And Ever To Leave It, For It Would Take A Lifetime And More Than One To Comprehend And Enjoy It Satisfactorily.

Life, Within Doors, Has Few Pleasanter Prospects Than A Neatly-arranged And Well-provisioned Breakfast-table.

How Is It Possible To Sayan Unkind Or Irreverential Word Of Rome? The City Of All Time, And Of All The World!

Is It A Fact-or Have I Dreamt It-that, By Means Of Electricity, The World Of Matter Has Become A Great Nerve, Vibrating Thousands Of Miles In A Breathless Point Of Time?

In The Depths Of Every Heart There Is A Tomb And A Dungeon, Though The Lights, The Music, And The Revelry Above May Cause Us To Forget Their Existence.

Just As There Comes A Warm Sunbeam Into Every Cottage Window, So Comes A Lovebeam Of God's Care And Pity For Every Separate Need.

We Sometimes Congratulate Ourselves.

Last Night, There Came A Frost, Which Has Done Great Damage To My Garden.... It Is Sad That Nature Will Play Such Tricks On Us Poor Mortals, Inviting Us With Sunny Smiles To Confide In Her, And Then, When We Are Entirely Within Her Power, Striking Us To The Heart.

Some Attribute Had Departed From Her, The Permanence Of Which Had Been Essential To Keep Her A Woman. Such Is Frequently The Fate, And Such The Stern Development, Of The Feminine Character And Person, When The Woman Has Encountered, And Lived Through, An Experience Of Peculiar Severity. If She Be All Tenderness, She Will Die. If She Survive, The Tenderness Will Either Be Crushed Out Of Her, Or—and The Outward Semblance Is The Same—crushed So Deeply Into Her Heart That It Can Never Show Itself More.

Who Can Tell Where Happiness May Come, Or Where, Though An Expected Guest, It May Never Show Its Face?

There Is Something Truer And More Real, Than What We Can See With The Eyes, And Touch With The Finger.

The Whole Forest Was Peopled With Frightful Sounds-the Creaking Of The Trees, The Howling Of Wild Beasts, And The Yell Of Indians; While Sometimes The Wind Tolled Like A Distant Church Bell, And Sometimes Gave A Broad Roar Around The Traveler, As If All Nature Were Laughing Him To Scorn. But He Was Himself The Chief Horror Of The Scene, And Shrank Not From Its Other Horrors.

The Greatest Obstacle To Being Heroic Is The Doubt Whether One May Going To Prove One's Self A Fool.

There Are Many Things In This World That A Child Must Not Ask About.

Man Is A Wretch Without Woman; But Woman Is A Monster-and Thank Heaven, An Almost Impossible And Hitherto Imaginary Monster--without Man, As Her Acknowledged Principal!

In The Depths Of Every Heart, There Is A Tomb And A Dungeon, Though The Lights, The Music, And Revelry Above May Cause Us To Forget Their Existence, And The Buried Ones, Or Prisoners Whom They Hide. But Sometimes, And Oftenest At Midnight, Those Dark Receptacles Are Flung Wide Open. In An Hour Like This, When The Mind Has A Passive Sensibility, But No Active Strength; When The Imagination Is A Mirror, Imparting Vividness To All Ideas, Without The Power Of Selecting Or Controlling Them; Then Pray That Your Grieves May Slumber, And The Brotherhood Of Remorse Not Break Their Chain.

The Traveller Knows Not Who May Be Concealed By The Innumerable Trunks And The Thick Boughs Overhead; So That With Lonely Footsteps He May Yet Be Passing Through An Unseen Multitude.

The Greatest Obstacle To Being Heroic Is The Doubt Whether One May Not Be Going To Prove One's Self A Fool; The Truest Heroism Is To Resist The Doubt; And The Profoundest Wisdom, To Know When It Ought To Be Resisted, And When It Be Obeyed.

An Unhappy Gentleman, Resolving To Wed Nothing Short Of Perfection, Keeps His Heart And Hand Till Both Get So Old And Withered That No Tolerable Woman Will Accept Them.

Death Should Take Me While I Am In The Mood.

As The Moral Gloom Of The World Overpowers All Systematic Gaiety, Even So Was Their Home Of Wild Mirth Made Desolate Amid The Sad Forest.

What A Happy And Holy Fashion It Is That Those Who Love One Another Should Rest On The Same Pillow.

And There I Sat, Long Long Ago, Waiting For The World To Know Me.

Come, Therefore, And Let Us Fling Mud At Them!

Technologies Of Easy Travel Give Us Wings; They Annihilate The Toil And Dust Of Pilgrimage; They Spiritualize Travel! Transition Being So Facile, What Can Be Any Man's Inducement To Tarry In One Spot?

It Was One Of Those Moments—which Sometimes Occur Only At The Interval Of Years—when A Man's Moral Aspect Is Faithfully Revealed To His Mind's Eye. Not Improbably, He Had Never Before Viewed Himself As He Did Now.

If We Take The Freedom To Put A Friend Under Our Microscope, We Thereby Insulate Him From Many Of His True Relations, Magnify His Peculiarities, Inevitably Tear Him Into Parts, And, Of Course, Patch Him Very Clumsily Together Again. What Wonder, Then, Should We Be Frightened By The Aspect Of A Monster.

Echo Is The Voice Of A Reflection In A Mirror.

I Do Detest All Offices - All, At Least, That Are Held On A Political Tenure.

The Love Of Posterity Is The Consequence Of The Necessity Of Death. If A Man Were Sure Of Living Forever Here, He Would Not Care About His Offspring.

Or-but This More Rarely Happened-she Would Be Convulsed With A Rage Of Grief, And Sob Out Her Love For Her Mother, In Broken Words, And Seem Intent On Proving That She Had A Heart, By Breaking It.

To The Untrue Man, The Whole Universe Is False- It Is Impalpable- It Shrinks To Nothing Within His Grasp. And He Himself Is In So Far As He Shows Himself In A False Light, Becomes A Shadow, Or, Indeed, Ceases To Exist.

What Would A Man Do, If He Were Compelled To Live Always In The Sultry Heat Of Society, And Could Never Bathe Himself In Cool Solitude?

What Is There So Ponderous In Evil, That A Thumb's Bigness Of It Should Outweigh The Mass Of Things Not Evil, Which Were Heaped Into The Other Scale!

Those With Whom We Can Apparently Become Well Acquainted In A Few Moments Are Generally The Most Difficult To Rightly Know And To Understand.

When The Artist Rises High Enough To Achieve The Beautiful, The Symbol By Which He Makes It Perceptible To Mortal Senses Becomes Of Little Value In His Eyes, While His Spirit Possesses Itself In The Enjoyment Of The Reality.

That Pit Of Blackness That Lies Beneath Us, Everywhere ... The Firmest Substance Of Human Happiness Is But A Thin Crust Spread Over It, With Just Reality Enough To Bear Up The Illusive Stage-scenery Amid Which We Tread. It Needs No Earthquake To Open The Chasm.

The Ideas Of People In General Are Not Raised Higher Than The Roofs Of The Houses. All Their Interests Extend Over The Earth's Surface In A Layer Of That Thickness. The Meeting-house Steeple Reaches Out Of Their Sphere.

There Is No Greater Bugbear Than A Strong Willed Relative In The Circle Of His Own Connections.

No Man For Any Considerable Period Can Wear One Face To Himself And Another To The Multitude, Without Finally Getting Bewildered As To Which May Be The True.

Death Was Too Definite An Object To Be Wished For Or Avoided.

I Love My Mother, But There Has Been, Ever Since My Boyhood, A Sort Of Coldness Of Intercourse Between Us, Such As Is Apt To Come Between People Of Strong Feelings.

The Trees Reflected In The River - They Are Unconscious Of A Spiritual World So Near To Them. So Are We.

In All Her Intercourse With Society, However, There Was Nothing That Made Her Feel As If She Belonged To It... She Stood Apart From Mortal Interests, Yet Close Beside Them, Like A Ghost That Revisits The Familiar Fireside, And Can No Longer Make Itself Seen Or Felt.

The Marble Keeps Merely A Cold And Sad Memory Of A Man Who Would Else Be Forgotten. No Man Who Needs A Monument Ever Ought To Have One.

There Is Evil In Every Human Heart, Which May Remain Latent, Perhaps, Through The Whole Of Life; But Circumstances May Rouse It To Activity.

The Inward Pleasure Of Imparting Pleasure - That Is The Choicest Of All.

Labor Is The Curse Of The World, And Nobody Can Meddle With It Without Becoming Proportionately Brutalized.

Selfishness Is One Of The Qualities Apt To Inspire Love.

To-morrow Would Bring Its Own Trial With It; So Would The Next Day, And So Would The Next; Each Its Own Trial, And Yet The Very Same That Was Now So Unutterably Grievous To Be Borne. The Days Of The Far-off Future Would Toil Onward, Still With The Same Burden For Her To Take Up, And Bear Along With Her, But Never To Fling Down; For The Accumulating Days, And Added Years, Would Pile Up Their Misery Upon The Heap Of Shame.

Some Maladies Are Rich And Precious And Only To Be Acquired By The Right Of Inheritance Or Purchased With Gold.

This Greatest Mortal Consolation, Which We Derive From The Transitoriness Of All Things-from The Right Of Saying, In Every Conjuncture, "this, Too, Will Pass Away.

No Summer Ever Came Back, And No Two Summers Ever Were Alike. Times Change, And People Change; And If Our Hearts Do Not Change As Readily, So Much The Worse For Us.

The Thing You Set Your Mind On Is The Thing You Ultimately Become.

Law Of Attraction

New England Is Quite As Large A Lump Of Earth As My Heart Can Really Take In.

Happiness In This World, When It Comes, Comes Incidentally. Make It The Object Of Pursuit, And It Leads Us A Wild-goose Chase, And Is Never Attained. Follow Some Other Object, And Very Possibly We May Find That We Have Caught Happiness Without Dreaming Of It.

Let Men Tremble To Win The Hand Of Woman, Unless They Win Along With It The Utmost Passion Of Her Heart! Else It May Be Their Miserable Fortune, When Some Mightier Touch Than Their Own May Have Awakened All Her Sensibilities, To Be Reproached Even For The Calm Content, The Marble Image Of Happiness, Which They Will Have Imposed Upon Her As The Warm Reality.

Life, Within Doors, Has Few Pleasanter Prospects Than A Neatly-arranged And Well-provisioned Breakfast-table. We Come To It Freshly, In The Dewy Youth Of The Day, And When Our Spiritual And Sensual Elements Are In Better Accord Than At A Later Period; So That The Material Delights Of The Morning Meal Are Capable Of Being Fully Enjoyed, Without Any Very Grievous Reproaches, Whether Gastric Or Conscientious, For Yielding Even A Trifle Overmuch To The Animal Department Of Our Nature.

What We Call Real Estate - The Solid Ground To Build A House On - Is The Broad Foundation On Which Nearly All The Guilt Of This World Rests.

It Loves More Readily Than It Hates.

Hatred And Anger

Wherever There Is A Heart And An Intellect, The Diseases Of The Physical Frame Are Tinged With The Peculiarities Of These.

He Had Been Driven Hither By The Impulse Of That Remorse Which Dogged Him Everywhere, And Whose Own Sister And Closely Linked Companion Was That Cowardice Which Invariably Drew Him Back, With Her Tremulous Gripe, Just When The Other Impulse Had Hurried Him To The Verge Of A Disclosure.

I Cannot Endure To Waste Anything As Precious As Autumn Sunshine By Staying In The House. So I Spend Almost All The Daylight Hours In The Open Air.

Never Was There A Dingier, Uglier, Less Picturesque City Than London ... It Is Really Wonderful That So Much Brick And Stone, For Centuries Together, Should Have Been Built Up With So Poor A Result.

Our Creator Would Never Have Made Such Lovely Days, And Have Given Us The Deep Hearts To Enjoy Them, Above And Beyond All Thought, Unless We Were Meant To Be Immortal.

Insincerity In A Man's Own Heart Must Make All His Enjoyments, All That Concerns Him, Unreal; So That His Whole Life Must Seem Like A Merely Dramatic Representation.

Now Are Ye Undeceived. Evil Is The Nature Of Mankind. Evil Must Be Your Only Happiness. Welcome Again, My Children, To The Communion Of Your Race.

Would Time But Await The Close Of Our Favorite Follies, We Should All Be Young Men, All Of Us, And Until Doom's Day.

It Is Not Good For Man To Cherish A Solitary Ambition. Unless There Be Those Around Him, By Whose Example He May Regulate Himself, His Thoughts, Desires, And Hopes Will Become Extravagant, And He The Semblance, Perhaps The Reality, Of A Madman

Let The Attempt Be Made, At Whatever Risk.

If The Truth Were To Be Known, Everyone Would Be Wearing A Scarlet Letter Of One Form Or Another.

By The Sympathy Of Your Human Hearts For Sin Ye Shall Scent Out All The Places Whether In Church, Bedchamber, Street, Field, Or Forest Where Crime Has Been Committed, And Shall Exult To Behold The Whole Earth One Stain Of Guilt, One Mighty Blood Spot.

There Is No Season When Such Pleasant And Sunny Spots May Be Lighted On, And Produce So Pleasant An Effect On The Feelings As Now In October.

What Other Dungeon Is So Dark As One's Own Heart! What Jailer So Inexorable As One's Self!

Writing Can Come Naturally To Some. Still, When It Comes To Good Writing, This Is True: Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing.

It Is Because The Spirit Is Inestimable, That The Lifeless Body Is So Little Valued.

Ugliness Without Tact Is Horrible.

Most People Are So Constituted That They Can Only Be Virtuous In A Certain Routine; An Irregular Course Of Life Demoralizes Them.

I Have Laughed, In Bitterness And Agony Of Heart, At The Contrast Between What I Seem And What I Am!

Though We Speak Nonsense, God Will Pick Out The Meaning Of It.

Happiness Is Like A Butterfly - The More You Chase, The More Subtle, But If You Stop Moving And Quietly Wait For It To Land On You.

The Heart Of True Womanhood Knows Where Its Own Sphere Is, And Never Seeks To Stray Beyond It!

The Aspect Of The Venerable Mansion Has Always Affected Me Like A Human Countenance, Bearing The Traces Not Merely Of Outward Storm And Sunshine, But Expressive Also, Of The Long Lapse Of Mortal Life, And Accompanying Vicissitudes That Have Passed Within. Were These To Be Worthily Recounted, They Would Form A Narrative Of No Small Interest And Instruction, And Possessing, Moreover, A Certain Remarkable Unity, Which Might Almost Seem The Result Of Artistic Arrangement.

America Is Now Wholly Given Over To A D--d Mob Of Scribbling Women, And I Should Have No Chance Of Success While The Public Taste Is Occupied With Their Trash - And Should Be Ashamed Of Myself If I Did Succeed. What Is The Mystery Of These Innumerable Editions Of The Lamplighter, And Other Books Neither Better Nor Worse? - Worse They Could Not Be, And Better They Need Not Be, When They Sell By 100,000.

Cannot You Conceive That Another Man May Wish Well To The World And Struggle For Its Good On Some Other Plan Than Precisely That Which You Have Laid Down?

When Individuals Approach One Another With Deep Purposes On Both Sides They Seldom Come At Once To The Matter Which They Have Most At Heart. They Dread The Electric Shock Of A Too Sudden Contact With It.

Such Has Often Been My Apathy, When Objects Long Sought, And Earnestly Desired, Were Placed Within My Reach.

What We Need For Our Happiness Is Often Close At Hand, If We Knew But How To Seek For It.

There Is Something More Awful In Happiness Than In Sorrow--the Latter Being Earthly And Finite, The Former Composed Of The Substance And Texture Of Eternity, So That Spirits Still Embodied May Well Tremble At It.

His Stories Are Good To Hear At Night, Because We Can Dream About Them Asleep; And Good In The Morning, Too, Because Then We Can Dream About Them Awake. (cowslip)

Cupid In These Latter Times Has Probably Laid Aside His Bow And Arrow, And Uses Fire-arms -- A Pistol -- Perhaps A Revolver.

Every Young Sculptor Seems To Think That He Must Give The World Some Specimen Of Indecorous Womanhood, And Call It Eve, Venus, A Nymph, Or Any Name That May Apologize For A Lack Of Decent Clothing.

Nervous And Excitable Persons Need To Talk A Great Deal, By Way Of Letting Off Their Steam.

Sunlight Is Like The Breath Of Life To The Pomp Of Autumn.

Nobody, I Think, Ought To Read Poetry, Or Look At Pictures Or Statues, Who Cannot Find A Great Deal More In Them Than The Poet Or Artist Has Actually Expressed. Their Highest Merit Is Suggestiveness.

One Picture In Ten Thousand, Perhaps, Ought To Live In The Applause Of Mankind, From Generation To Generation Until The Colors Fade And Blacken Out Of Sight Or The Canvas Rot Entirely Away.

Our Most Intimate Friend Is Not He To Whom We Show The Worst, But The Best Of Our Nature.

It [catholicism] Supplies A Multitude Of External Forms In Which The Spiritual May Be Clothed And Manifested.

Happiness Is Like A Butterfly.

Like A Butterfly

Can Man Be So Age-stricken That No Faintest Sunshine Of His Youth May Re Visit Him Once A Year? It Is Impossible. The Moss On Our Time-worn Mansion Brightens Into Beauty; And The Good Old Pastor, Who Once Dwelt Here, Renewed His Prime And Regained His Boyhood In The Genial Breeze Of His Ninetieth Spring. Alas For The Worn And Heavy Soul, If, Whether In Youth Or Age, It Has Outlived Its Privilege Of Springtime Sprightliness!

Shall We Never Never Get Rid Of This Past? ... It Lies Upon The Present Like A Giant's Dead Body.

A Grave, Wherever Found, Preaches A Short And Pithy Sermon To The Soul.

Man's Own Youth Is The World's Youth; At Least He Feels As If It Were, And Imagines That The Earth's Granite Substance Is Something Not Yet Hardened, And Which He Can Mould Into Whatever Shape He Likes.

It Is A Good Lesson - Though It May Often Be A Hard One - For A Man... To Step Aside Out Of The Narrow Circle In Which His Claims Are Recognized, And To Find How Utterly Devoid Of Significance, Beyond That Circle, Is All That He Achieves, And All He Aims At.

The Present Is Burthened Too Much With The Past.

A Man's Bewilderment Is The Measure Of His Wisdom.

Articulate Words Are A Harsh Clamor And Dissonance. When Man Arrives At His Highest Perfection, He Will Again Be Dumb.

But, All This While, I Was Giving Myself Very Unnecessary Alarm. Providence Had Mediated Better Things For Me Than I Could Possibly Imagine For Myself.

What, In The Name Of Common-sense, Had I To Do With Any Better Society Than I Had Always Lived In?

Men Of Cold Passions Have Quick Eyes.

It [the Scarlet Letter] Had The Effect Of A Spell, Taking Her Out Of The Ordinary Relations With Humanity, And Enclosing Her In A Sphere By Herself.

Not Yet Hardened, Many Young Die Good.

Masculine Observers, If The Birth-mark Did Not Heighten Their Admiration, Contented Themselves With Wishing It Away, That The World Might Possess One Living Specimen Of Ideal Loveliness, Without The Semblance Of A Flaw.

It Was A Day In Early Spring; And As That Sweet, Genial Time Of Year And Atmosphere Calls Out Tender Greenness From The Ground,--beautiful Flowers, Or Leaves That Look Beautiful Because So Long Unseen Under The Snow And Decay,--so The Pleasant Air And Warmth Had Called Out Three Young People, Who Sat On A Sunny Hill-side Enjoying The Warm Day And One Another.

The Greatest Possible Mint Of Style Is To Make The Words Absolutely Disappear Into The Thought.

As Far As My Experience Goes, Men Of Genius Are Fairly Gifted With The Social Qualities; And In This Age, There Appears To Be A Fellow-feeling Among Them, Which Had Not Heretofore Been Developed. As Men, They Ask Nothing Better Than To Be On Equal Terms With Their Fellow-men; And As Authors, They Have Thrown Aside Their Proverbial Jealousy, And Acknowledge A Generous Brotherhood.

This Above All: Be True, Be True, Be True.

The Fiend In His Own Shape Is Less Hideous Than When He Rages In The Breast Of Men.

Every Individual Has A Place To Fill In The World And Is Important In Some Respect Whether He Chooses To Be So Or Not.

The Divine Chemistry Works In The Subsoil.

No Fountain So Small But That Heaven May Be Imaged In Its Bosom.

A Screen... The Scenery And The Figures Of Life Were Perfectly Represented, But With That Bewitching, Yet Indescribably Difference, Which Always Makes A Picture, An Image, Or A Shadow, So Much More Attractive Than The Original.

I Wish I Had The Gift Of Making Rhymes, For Methinks There Is Poetry In My Head And Heart Since I Have Been In Love With You.

Many Writers Lay Very Great Stress Upon Some Definite Moral Purpose, At Which They Profess To Aim Their Works.

The Sorrow That Lay Cold In Her Mother's Heart... Converted It Into A Tomb.

Love, Whether Newly Born, Or Aroused From A Deathlike Slumber, Must Always Create Sunshine, Filling The Heart So Full Of Radiance, This It Overflows Upon The Outward World.

I Used To Visit And Revisit It A Dozen Times A Day, And Stand In Deep Contemplation Over My Vegetable Progeny With A Love That Nobody Could Share Or Conceive Of Who Had Never Taken Part In The Process Of Creation. It Was One Of The Most Bewitching Sights In The World To Observe A Hill Of Beans Thrusting Aside The Soil, Or A Rose Of Early Peas Just Peeping Forth Sufficiently To Trace A Line Of Delicate Green.

The World Owes All Its Onward Impulses To Men Ill At Ease. The Happy Man Inevitably Confines Himself Within Ancient Limits.

There Is An Alchemy Of Quiet Malice By Which Women Can Concoct A Subtle Poison From Ordinary Trifles.

The Moment When A Man's Head Drops Off Is Seldom Or Never, I Am Inclined To Think, Precisely The Most Agreeable Of His Life. Nevertheless, Like The Greater Part Of Our Misfortunes, Even So Serious A Contingency Brings Its Remedy And Consolation With It, If The Sufferer Will But Make The Best, Rather Than The Worst, Of The Accident Which Has Befallen Him.

Human Nature Will Not Flourish, Any More Than A Potato, If It Be Planted And Replanted, For Too Long A Series Of Generations, In The Same Worn-out Soil. My Children Have Had Other Birthplaces, And, So Far As Their Fortunes May Be Within My Control, Shall Strike Their Roots Into Unaccustomed Earth.

Christian Faith Is A Grand Cathedral, With Divinely Pictured Windows. Standing Without, You See No Glory, Nor Can Possibly Imagine Any; Standing Within, Every Ray Of Light Reveals A Harmony Of Unspeakable Splendors.

It Is A Curious Subject Of Observation And Inquiry, Whether Hatred And Love Be Not The Same Thing At Bottom.

Happiness Is Not Found In Things You Possess, But In What You Have The Courage To Release.

See! Those Fiendish Lineaments Graven On The Darkness, The Writhed Lip Of Scorn, The Mockery Of That Living Eye, The Pointed Finger, Touching The Sore Place In Your Heart! Do You Remember Any Act Of Enormous Folly, At Which You Would Blush, Even In The Remotest Cavern Of The Earth? Then Recognize Your Shame.

It Is My Opinion That A Man's Soul May Be Buried And Perish Under A Dung-heap, Or In A Furrow Field, Just As Well As Under A Pile Of Money.

Bees Are Sometimes Drowned In The Honey Which They Collectso Some Writers Are Lost In Their Collected Learning.

Generosity Is The Flower Of Justice.

No, My Little Pearl! Thou Must Gather Thine Own Sunshine. I Have None To Give Thee.

A Singular Fact, That, When Man Is A Brute, He Is The Most Sensual And Loathsome Of All Brutes.

Salt Is White And Pure - There Is Something Holy In Salt.

A Long Time Ago, In A Town With Which I Used To Be Familiarly Acquainted, There Dwelt An Elderly Person Of Grim Aspect, Known By The Name And Title Of Doctor Grimshawe, Whose Household Consisted Of A Remarkably Pretty And Vivacious Boy, And A Perfect Rosebud Of A Girl, Two Or Three Years Younger Than He, And An Old Maid Of All Work, Of Strangely Mixed Breed, Crusty In Temper And Wonderfully Sluttish In Attire.

Some Illusions...are The Shadows Of Great Truths.

Before This Ugly Edifice, And Between It And The Wheel-track Of The Street, Was A Grass-plot, Much Overgrown With Burdock, Pig-weed, Apple-pern, And Such Unsightly Vegetation, Which Evidently Found Something Congenial In The Soil That Had So Early Borne The Black Flower Of Civilized Society, A Prison.

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