“There seemed a deep sense of life and joy about all; and although no airs blew from out the Heavens, yet everything had motion through the gentle sweepings to and fro of innumberable butterflies, that might have been mistaken for tullips with wings.”

“Archer reddened to the temples but dared not move or speak: it was as if her words had been some rare butterfly that the least motion might drive off on startled wings, but that might gather a flock if it were left undisturbed.”

“In everyone there sleepsA sense of life lived according to love.To some it means the difference they could makeBy loving others, but across most it sweeps, As all they might have done had they been loved.That nothing cures.”

“England was alive, throbbing through all her estuaries, crying for joy through the mouths of all her gulls, and the north wind, with contrary motion, blew stronger against her rising seas.”

“As Mary delivered what was to be her last lecture about the Galapagos Islands, she would be stopped mid-sentence for five seconds by a doubt which, if expressed in words, might have come out something like this: "Maybe I'm just a crazy lady who had wandered off the street and into this classroom and started explaining the mysteries of life to these people. And they believe me, although I am utterly mistaken about simply everything."She had to wonder, too, about all the supposedly great teachers of the past, who, although their brains were healthy, had turned out to be as wrong as Roy about what was really going on.”

“The joy about chasing butterflies, is not the satisfaction that comes at the end, but the path that takes you there;The irony about chasing butterflies, is that sometimes you'll get so lost in the chase, you won't realize that you're left chasing thin air;But the agony about chasing butterflies, is that sometimes you will keep on chasing, hoping, that a butterfly would materialize out of thin air.”