“People glorify all sorts of bravery except the bravery they might show on behalf of their nearest neighbors.”

“Sane people did what their neighbors did, so that if any lunatics were at large, one might know and avoid them.”

“In spite of his mildness and timidity in reproving, every one about him knew that on the exceptional occasions when he chose, he was absolute. He never, indeed, chose to be absolute except on some one else’s behalf.”

“The great safeguard of society and of domestic life was, that opinions were not acted on. Sane people did what their neighbors did, so that if any lunatics were at large, one might know and avoid them.”

“People are almost always better than their neighbors think they are.”

“For pain must enter into its glorified life of memory before it can turn into compassion.”

“Religious ideas have the fate of melodies, which, once set afloat in the world, are taken up by all sorts of instruments, some of them woefully coarse, feeble, or out of tune, until people are in danger of crying out that the melody itself is detestable.”