“There is no past we can bring back by longing for it. There is only an eternal now that builds and creates out of the past something new and better.”

“We all of us live upon the past, and through the past we are destroyed.”

“If you would create something,you must be something.”

“It is delightful to transport one's self into the spirit of the past, to see how a wise man has thought before us.”

“We often feel that we lack something, and seem to see that very quality in someone else, promptly attributing all our own qualities to him too, and a kind of ideal contentment as well. And so the happy mortal is a model of complete perfection--which we have ourselves created.”

“I mean now to try and see her as soon as I can: or perhaps, on second thoughts, I had better not; it is better I should behold her through the eyes of her lover. To my sight, perhaps, she would not appear as she now stands before me; and why should I destroy so sweet a picture?”

“it hurts me when we can only travel a short stretch on the same road”