“The world we live in is but thickened light.”

“To the illuminated mind the whole world burns and sparkles with light.”

“To a dull mind all of nature is leaden. To the illumined mind the whole world burns and sparkles with light.”

“It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.”

“We are always getting ready to live, but never living.”

“We mark with light in the memory the few interviews we have had with souls that made our souls wiser, that spoke what we thought, that told us what we knew, that gave us leave to be what we inly are.”

“The sun shines and warms and lights us and we have no curiosity to know why this is so; but we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and hunger, and mosquitoes and silly people.”