“If you want to improve your understanding, drink coffee.”

“The main question to a novel is -- did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten? were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If a novel produces these effects, it is good; if it does not -- story, language, love, scandal itself cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that or it does nothing.”

“Mankind are always happy for having happiness. So if you make them happy now, you make them happy twenty years from now by the memory of it. ”

“Live always in the best company when you read.”

“When you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the day a happy one for a fellow creature.”

“I am glad you like what I said of Mrs. Elizabeth Fry (prison and mental hospital reformer). She is very unpopular with the clergy; examples of living, active virtue disturb our repose and give one to distressing comparisons; we long to burn her alive.”

“we know nothing of tomorrow, our business is to be good and happy today”