The dreamer's valuation of a thing lost - not another man's - is the only standard to measure it by, and his grief for it makes it large and great and fine, and is worthy of our reverence in all cases.
When I take up one of Jane Austen's books ... I feel like a barkeep entering the kingdom of heaven. I know what his sensation would be and his private comments. He would not find the place to his taste, and he would probably say so.
I never made a success of a lecture delivered in a church yet. People are afraid to laugh in a church. They can't be made to do it in any possible way.
I have done more for San Francisco than any of its old residents. Since I left there it has increased in population fully 300,000. I could have done more - I could have gone earlier - it was suggested.
In religion, India is the only millionaire... the One land that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for all the shows of all the rest of the globe combined.
I don't see any use in having a uniform and arbitrary way of spelling words. We might as well make all clothes alike and cook all dishes alike. Sameness is tiresome; variety is pleasing.
I felt it was my duty to praise all of God's works with fervent enthusiasm. At the same time I killed flies in my house in a spirit of hatred, exasperation and contempt. My praise to God for all his works was dishonest, the act of killing the fly was honest.