"It is a wretched thing to pass one's life among those utterly incapable of appreciating us ; upon whom our sense or our sentiment, our wit or our affection, are equally thrown away : people who make some unreal and distorted picture of us — say it is our likeness, and act accordingly."

"[From Lady Mandeville]: … we over-educate the memory, while the temper and the feelings are neglected, forgetting that the future will be governed much more by the affections than by the understanding."

"The human heart is like Pandora's box — only it is hatred, not hope, that lies curled up at the bottom. It is well we are little in the habit of analysing our common and passing sensations, — we should be horror-struck at our own quantity of hate."

"With the concentrated anger of fourteen patriots at a list of sinecures in which they have no part, or a dozen professors who find they cannot get pupils — nor fees without, Lord Merton steadied his voice, almost inarticulate from rage, …"

"No time passes so rapidly as that of painful expectancy, —No hour arrives so soon as the one we dread."

"How untrue, to say youth is the happiest season of our life ! it is filled with vexations, for almost all its ideas are false ones ; they must be set right, and often how harshly ! Its hopes are actual beliefs: how often must they be taught doubt by disappointment ! And then its keen feelings, laying themselves so bare to the beak of the vulture experience ! Youth is a season that has no repose."

"[From Edward Lorriane]: We speak ill of our neighbours, not from ill-nature, but idleness ; satire is only the cayenne of conversation : people have so few subjects for talking about in common with their friends but their friends ; and it is utterly impossible to dress them as Fontenelle did his asparagus, toute en huile."

"I have heard it said, that no man ever believes a woman can fall in love with his friend : I would add, she certainly falls marvellously in his opinion if she does —"

"Physical miseries greatly add to the discomfort of mental ones."

"[From Emily]: It is curious, that when we feel in ourselves the most inclined to silence, we almost always fancy it is absolutely necessary we should talk."

"[From Mr Delawarr]: The desire of notoriety, and the love of fame, differ but little ; yet one is the meanest, the other the noblest feeling in our nature : the one looks to the present, and is a mixture of the selfish and the common-place — the other dwells upon the future, and is the generous and the exalted.”"

"[From Edward Lorraine]: If this city system of colonisation goes on, our children will advertise a green tree, like an elephant, as 'this most wonderful production of nature ;' and the meaning of green grass will only be to be found in the dictionary."

"Shame is the worst pang of unrequited affection."

"[From Edward Lorraine]: ... pretension is a sort of general election, depending on universal suffrage, and subject to canvassing and criticism."

"[From Mr Delawarr]: As it is the great principle of political economy to tax luxuries, why are not reports taxed ? Are they not the chief luxuries of society ? Of all my senses, I thank Heaven that of hearing is limited ; the dative case is very well — hearing what is said to me ; but preserve me from the ablative case — hearing what is said about me !"

"… the science of human happiness — and all is science now-a-days — is greatly in arrear, or we should fix the middle of the day for farewells."

"[Reply from Mr Delawarr]: Even, as we eulogise the peace and innocence of a country life ; for the peace of the parish, apply to the rector on the tithe day — for its innocence, to the justice of the peace."

"[From Lady Mandeville]: I believe, that we abuse the age we live in, on the same principle that we take liberties with our friends. The poor present time, how it is calumniated ! degenerate, immoral, irreligious, are its best epithets ; and we talk of the good old time till we really believe it existed."

"However, there is always one solace to misery, as there is one drawback to pleasure, — they must all have an end, …"

"How mistaken is the phrase, "every delicacy of the season " — they mean out of season. Grapes are ripe at the same time as strawberries, and peaches come in with the crocuses."

"The truth is, Lord Merton was, simply, naturally and intensely selfish ; he was himself "the ocean of his thoughts ;" he never considered the comfort of other people, because he never looked at it as distinct from his own ; and the most romantic devotion, the most self-denying love, would have seemed, if he were the object of it, as quite in the common course of things. This is a common character, which age alone developes into deformity. Youth, like charity, covers a multitude of sins ; but Heaven help the wife, children, servants, and all other pieces of domestic property, when such a man is fifty, and has the gout !"

"[From Edward Lorraine]: I think romance can never take a very high tone but in times of great civilisation. Romance is more matter of feeling than of passion ; and if violent passions belong to a barbarous, strong feelings belong to a civilised state. The refinement of our tastes, of course, is communicated to our sentiments ; and we exaggerate, subtilise, and spiritualise — the three chief ingredients of romance."

"What an odd thing experience is ! — now turning over so rapidly the book of life, now writing so much on a single leaf."

"[From Lady Mandeville]: Nay, nay — it is to shew us how well you can do without us. I daily expect, in these times of reform and retrenchment, that a bill will be brought into the House for the suppression of the female sex, as an expensive and useless superfluity."

"[From a lady known as our English Corinne]: 'Now, do you not see what a wicked little girl you are? Why do you not pray to God every morning to make you a better child ? ' 'And so I do,' sobbed the poor little thing, 'but he only makes me worserer and worserer.’"

"Not one in a thousand knows how to put on a bonnet : they set it on one side like a disagreeable recollection ; or bolt upright, as if they wanted to realise Shakespeare's worst of puns, — "and she, like France, was at war with her hair (heir)." No such very great degree of genius can be displayed in the rest of the toilet. The dress has been chosen — it fits you à ravir — it has simply to be put on with mathematical accuracy : but the bonnet is the triumph of taste, — you must exert your intellect, — your destiny is in your own hands."

"People are often very generous in giving what is of no value : is it on this principle that one lady is usually so profuse in her admiration of the dress of another ?"

"[From Edward Lorraine]: —news lasts longer in the country than it does in town—"

"— Love is the least calculating of all dreamers, —"

"Of all passions, love is the most engrossing and the most superstitious. How often has a leaf, a star, a breath of wind, been held as an omen ! It draws all things into somewhat of relation to itself: it is despotic, and jealous of all authority but its own : it bars the heart against the entrance of other feelings, and deems wandering thoughts its traitors."

"[From Emily]: At all events, that gentleman's self-estimate is a pleasant one who believes that every man looks up to, and that every woman is in love with him."

"All sweeping assertions are erroneous."

"[From Mr Edward Lorraine]: Nothing is more difficult than to paint from nature — nothing so pleasant when achieved."

"From childhood we hear some few great names to which mind has given an immortality : they are called the benefactors of their kind — their words are familiar to our lips — our early thoughts take their tone, our first mental pleasures are derived, from their pages — we admire, and then we imitate —we think how glorious it is to let the spirit thus go forth, winning a throne in men's hearts, sending our thoughts, like the ships of Tyre laden with rich merchandise, over the ocean of human opinion, and bringing back a still richer cargo of praise and goodwill. Thus was it with the great men of old, and so shall it be with us. We forget that Time, the Sanctifier, has been with them ; that no present interests jar against theirs ; and that around them is the calm and the solemnity of the grave; and we forget the ordeal through which they have passed to the temple."

"Clubs are just a modification of monasteries — places of refuge from female attentions ; and, as in former days, the finest architecture, the best situation, the most elaborate cuisine, the most refined cellar, are devoted to their use. The principal modern improvements are the omission of fasting and penance, and the substitution of magazines for missals."

"Those who have no part in the conflict see with the imagination : they behold the crimson banner, hear the stately trumpet, and think not of the dust of the march, or the agony of the battle ; …"

"[From Mr Morland]: … we like and require truth — always supposing and allowing that the said truth interferes neither with our interests nor our inclinations."

"Childhood is not often a happy season — it is too much forced and controlled, …"

"It is true enough for a proverb, that the pleasantest parties are those of which the least can be told."

"Our nature has many mysteries — the moral and physical world are strangely allied ; the weight on the air presages the hurricane — the darkness on the heaven the tempest — why may not destiny have its signs, and the heart its portents, …"

"Or is there a prophetic spirit in the human mind, which makes those of the keenest feelings often appear cold ; an intuitive, though unowned fear, repressing sensations of such deep and intense power ? They can not feel only a little ; and they shrink, though with an unconscious dread, from feeling too much."

"[From Edward Lorraine]: … : you know ladies never dress but for each other ; …"

"Shyness is too much a mere impulse in very early youth to be lasting ; …"

"Do not tell me of the happiness of life, when every day begins with a struggle and a sacrifice. To get up in the morning, both in the enjoyment it resigns and the resolution it requires, is an act of heroism."

"[From Mr Morland]: Ridicule may be the test of truth, but it is not its result."

"[From Edward Lorraine]: The monarch must be noble as his dwelling ; ..."

"[From Emily]: Good taste is his religion, his morality, his standard, and his test. … … Consistency of action, attention to results, and also to present benefit on the one side, and harmony of colour and graceful effect on the other, he urges arise from the same principle under different circumstances — viz. good taste !"

"[From Edward Lorraine]: By the by, I think it among the great honours to French literature, that one of its most original branches, fairy tales, is peculiarly its own."

"A century or two ago, the best blood in the kingdom was spent in defence of the right divine of kings — and it was called heroic conduct ; now it is to be shed in defence of the rights of the people — and that is very heroic conduct too. I wonder what will be heroic conduct a century hence."

"Ireland, last year, was to be paradise, if that Peri, emancipation, was but sent there ; now it is a wretched, degraded, oppressed country, unless the Union be dissolved !"