“In the fatal course of the most painful ailments, sometimes […], sometimes there occur sweet mornings of perfect repose- and that not owning to some blessed pill or potion […] or at least without our knowing that the loving hand of despair slipped us the drug.”

“And it may be that love sometimes occurs without pain or misery.”

“For sometime now I have believed that it is our own force, all our own force that is still too great for us. It is true that we do not know it; but is it not just that which is most our own of which we know the least?”

“I will show you a love potion without drug or herb, or any witch's spell; if you wish to be loved, love.”

“We forget that sometimes there is something greater than our pain. That's the pain of the person who loves us, who couldn't protect us from that pain.”

“Despair ... is the only cure for illusion. Without despair we cannot transfer our allegiance to reality - it's a kind of mourning period for our fantasies. Some people do not survive this despair, but no major change within a person can occur without it.”