“The trouble was, my feelings for Patch weren't harmless.”

“If you can't feel, why did you kiss me?"Patch traced a finger along my collarbone, then headed south stopping at my heart. I felt it pounding through my skin. "Because I feel it here, in my heart," he said quietly.”

“I was a lonely boy. I spent all my time reading books and watching the world. [some] tried to draw me out at first, but their hearts weren't in it. And after all, they had enough troubles of their own.”

“A little girl loves her bird--Why? Because it lives and feels; because it is helpless and harmless? A toad, likewise, lives and feels, and is equally helpless and harmless; but though she would not hurt a toad, she cannot love it like the bird, with its graceful form, soft feathers, and bright, speaking eyes.”

“I feel an earnest and humble desire, and shall do till I die, to increase the stock of harmless cheerfulness.”

“His being there was stirring up a lot of memories she'd have been happier to leave as sentimental sediment. Not that they weren't good memories. That was the trouble.”