“Without death in the world, existence in it would soon become, through over-population, the most frightful of curses.”

It is our relation to circumstances that determine their influence over us. The same wind that blows one ship into port may blow another off shore.

There is no tyrant like custom, and no freedom where its edicts are not resisted.

Wit never appears to greater advantage than when it is successfully exerted to relieve from a dilemma, palliate a deficiency, or cover a retreat.

The great artist is a slave to his ideals.

When we get tired of enjoying all the pleasures within our reach, we have still a resource in thinking of others that are not.

Example has more followers than reason. We unconsciously imitate what pleases us, and approximate to the characters we most admire.

The cheerful live longest in years, and afterwards in our regards. Cheerfulness is the off-shoot of goodness.

The passions are like fire, useful in a thousand ways and dangerous only in one, through their excess.

Winter is the night of vegetation.

A profusion of fancies and quotations is out of place in a love-letter. True feeling is always direct, and never deviates into by-ways to cull flowers of rhetoric.

What we call conscience in many instances, is only a wholesome fear of the law.

There is great beauty in going through life without anxiety or fear. Half our fears are baseless, and the other half discreditable.

There is probably no hell for authors in the next world – they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this.

Kindred weaknesses induce friendships as often as kindred virtues.

The heart contracts as the pocket expands.

Hope is the best part of our riches.

I think cursing is a bunch of malarkey.

Is it a blessing or is it a curse, to feel everything so deeply.

I feel everything to the bottom of its depth maybe its a gift, its probably a curse.

Time might only tell if this will be comfort or a curse.

I grew up cursing a lot.

If I start going back to church, I’d have to stop the smoking and drinking, and I wouldn’t be able to curse any more.

Caring can be a curse.

Respect your curses, for they are the instruments of your destiny.