Books are good enough in their own way, but they are a poor substitute for life

Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well.

There is only one difference between a long life and a good dinner: that, in the dinner, the sweets come last.

The very flexibility and ease which make men's friendships so agreeable while they endure, make them the easier to destroy and forget. And a man who has a few friends, or one who has a dozen (if there be any one so wealthy on this earth), cannot forget on how precarious a base his happiness reposes; and how by a stroke or two of fate /a death, a few light words, a piece of stamped paper, a woman's bright eyes /he may be left, in a month, destitute of all.

Anyone can carry his burden, however hard, until nightfall. Anyone can do his work, however hard, for one day. Anyone can live sweetly, patiently, lovingly, purely, till the sun goes down. And this is all life really means.

Teacher, tender comrade, wife, A fellow-farer true through life