“I love man as my fellow; but his scepter, real, or usurped, extends not to me, unless the reason of an individual demands my homage; and even then the submission is to reason, and not to man.”

Virtue flies from a house divided against itself—and a whole legion of devils take up their residence there.

I do not wish them women to have power over men; but over themselves.

Taught from infancy that beauty is woman’s sculpture the mind shapes itself to the body and roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison.

True sensibility, the sensibility which is the auxiliary of virtue, and the soul of genius, is in society so occupied with the feelings of others, as scarcely to regard its own sensations.

Let woman share the rights, and she will emulate the virtues of man; for she must grow more perfect when emancipated, or justify the authority that chains such a weak being to her duty.

Women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions which men think it manly to pay to their sex, when, in fact, men are insultingly supporting their own superiority.

Few, I believe, have had much affection for mankind, who did not first love their parents, their brothers, sisters, and even the domestic brutes, whom they first played with.

We must all be in love once in our lives.

The man who had some virtue whilst he was struggling for a crown, often becomes a voluptuous tyrant when it graces his brow.

Friendship is a serious affection; the most sublime of all affections, because it is founded on principle, and cemented by time.

I gazed around with rapture, and felt more of that spontaneous pleasure which gives credibility to our expectation of happiness than I had for a long, long time before.

Men of genius and talents have started out of a class, in which women have never yet been placed.

Some women govern their husbands without degrading themselves, because intellect will always govern.

Let us eat, drink, and love for tomorrow we die, would be in fact the language of reason, the morality of life; and who but a fool would part with a reality for a fleeting shadow?

Only by the jostlings of equality can we form a just opinion of ourselves.

Men, indeed, appear to me to act in a very unphilosophical manner when they try to secure the good conduct of women by attempting to keep them always in a state of childhood.

When you fall in love with the process rather than the product, you don’t have to wait to give yourself permission to be happy. You can be satisfied anytime your system is running.

How marvelous it is that I can have so much in my life, and I want to share it just with you.

Better yourself. Don’t belittle yourself.

Either we are adrift in chaos or we are individuals, created, loved, upheld and placed purposefully, exactly where we are. Can you believe that? Can you trust God for that?

It is love that I am seeking for, But of a beautiful, unheard-of kind That is not in the world.

I didn’t become successful until I became myself.

You can love them, forgive them, want good things for them, but still move on without them.

Day in and day out, there is no doubt that you stand out.