Every work [of literature] has both a situation and a story. The situation is the context or circumstance, sometimes the plot; the story is the emotional experience that preoccupies the writer: the insight, the wisdom, the thing one has come to say
Keep away from the fire!
I take a simple view of life. It is keep your eyes open and get on with it.
Respect for ourselves guides our morals, respect for others guides our manners.
What a large volume of adventures may be grasped within this little span of life by him who interests his heart in every thing, and who, having eyes to see, what time and chance are perpetually holding out to him as he journeyeth on his way, misses nothing he can fairly lay his hands on.
Men tire themselves in pursuit of rest.
Only the brave know how to forgive. . . a coward never forgave; it is not in his nature.
To be enlightened doesn't mean you end up stupefied and unable to function.
I think sometimes I think too damn much. I worry about this and that and everything else and then I wake up and four more years have slipped right out the back door.
Of course! The path to heaven doesn't lie down in flat miles. It's in the imagination with which you perceive this world, and the gestures with which you honor it.
Trying to describe a good marriage is like trying to describe your adrenal glands. You know they're in there functioning but you don't really understand how they work.