Those who have suffered much are like those who know many languages; they have learned to understand and be understood by all.
We are amused through the intellect, but it is the heart that saves us from ennui.
We are often prophets to others only because we are our own historians.
The injustice of men subserves the justice of God, and often His mercy.
It would seem that by our sorrows only are we called to a knowledge of the Infinite. Are we happy? The limits of life constrain us on all sides.
Might we not say to the confused voices which sometimes arise from the depths of our being: "Ladies, be so kind as to speak only four at a time?"
The inventory of my faith for this lower world is soon made out. I believe in Him who made it.
A malicious enemy is better than a clumsy friend.
He who has ceased to enjoy his friend's superiority has ceased to love him.
Time is the shower of Danae; each drop is golden.
If we look closely at this earth, where God seems so utterly forgotten, we shall find that it is He, after all, who commands the most fidelity and the most love.
Suspicion has its dupes, as well as credulity.
When fresh sorrows have caused us to take some steps in the right way, we may not complain. We have invested in a life annuity, but the income remains.
I study much, and the more I study, the oftener I go back to those first principles which are so simple that childhood itself can lisp them.
Pride dries the tears of anger and vexation; humility, those of grief. The one is indignant that we should suffer; the other calms us by the reminder that we deserve nothing else.
America has begun her career at the culminating point of life, as Adam did at the age of thirty.
Real sorrow is almost as difficult to discover as real poverty. An instinctive delicacy hides the rays of the one and the wounds of the other.
I love victory, but I love not triumph.
Old age is the night of life, as night is the old age of the day. Still, night is full of magnificence; and, for many, it is more brilliant than the day.
When any one tells you that he belongs to no party, you may at any rate be sure that he does not belong to yours.
We must labor unceasingly to render our piety reasonable, and our reason pious.
Piety softens all that courage bears.
It is a little stream, which flows softly, but freshens everything along its course.
The very might of the human intellect reveals its limits.
The root of sanctity is sanity. A man must be healthy before he can be holy. We bathe first, and then perfume.
