“Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing.”

How often do I lull my seething blood to rest, for you have never seen anything so unsteady, so uncertain, as this heart.

Every day I observe more and more the folly of judging of others by ourselves; and I have so much trouble with myself, and my own heart is in such constant agitation, that I am well content to let others pursue their own course, if they only allow me the same privilege.

Difficulties increase the nearer we get to the goal.

We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.

A man sees in the world what he carries in his heart.

Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though ’twere his own.

The greatest evil that can befall man is that he should come to think ill of himself.

Every day one should at least hear one little song, read one good poem, see one fine painting and – if at all possible – speak a few sensible words.

If any man wish to write in a clear style, let him be first clear in his thoughts; and if any would write in a noble style, let him first possess a noble soul.

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.

What is uttered from the heart alone will win the heart of others to your own.

We usually lost today because there has been a yesterday, and tomorrow is coming.

The limits of my language are the limits of my universe.

The heights charm us, but the steps do not; with the mountain in our view we love to walk the plains.

I treat my heart like a sick child and gratify its every fancy.

I wait for the morning of my tears.

The future has several names. For the weak, it is impossible; for the fainthearted, it is unknown; but for the valiant, it is ideal.

Please go for your dreams. Whatever your ideals, you can become whatever you want to become.

An idealist is a person who helps other people to be prosperous.

Be alone, that is the secret of invention; be alone, that is when ideas are born.

It’s difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality.

It’s really a wonder that I haven’t dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart.

Be practical as well as generous in your ideals.

We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend. And we honor those ideals by upholding them not when it’s easy, but when it is hard.