“Hope may have a positive reputation, but it has a vicious downside. If you have hope, you can be crushed.”

“God is not here to be demanded of, begged from, or criticized. He hands out burdens to those who are strong enough to carry them, and I feel profoundly uncomfortable with the idea of lining up with the other invalids and asking for mine to be alleviated.”

“She had been so fiercely alive. She had spoken honestly, and lived with an honesty that few could claim to match. She had made the most of every minute she was given. She bargained and rationed and managed the seconds. She burned up the days.”

“Hope is a gift. You can't choose to have it. To believe and yet to have no hope is to thirst beside a fountain.”

“I know you have bad news,” I say softly. “I’m ready for it.”But that’s not true. One is never ready. You just lie and say you are and hope you can take the hit on the chin without going down.”

“Assaults by fanatics on our safety... does not justify assaults by the government on our freedom!”

“O! useful may it be to have shewn, that, though the vicious can sometimes pour affliction upon the good, their power is transient and their punishment certain; and that innocence, though oppressed by injustice, shall, supported by patience, finally triumph over misfortune!And, if the weak hand, that has recorded this tale, has, by its scenes, beguiled the mourner of one hour of sorrow, or, by its moral, taught him to sustain it—the effort, however humble, has not been vain, nor is the writer unrewarded.”