“Someone could walk into this room and say your life is on fire.”

“It's very helpful to start with something that's true. If you start with something that's false, you're always covering your tracks. Something simple and true, that has a lot of possibilities, is a nice way to begin.”

“Was a sunny day, not a cloud in the sky. Not a negative word was heard.”

“These are the days of lasers in the jungle, staccato signals of constant information.”

“It's actually very difficult to make something both simple and good.”

“What, no more ceremony? See, my women! Against the blown rose may they stop their nose That kneel'd unto the buds.”

“You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will more willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, except my life.”

“And makes me poor indeed.”

“Literature is a comprehensive essence of the intellectual life of a nation.”

“It has come to be practically a sort of rule in literature that a man, having once shown himself capable of original writing, is entitled thenceforth to steal from the writings of others at discretion.”

“But, if we explore the literature of Heroism, we shall quickly come to Plutarch, who is its Doctor and historian. To him we owe the Brasidas, the Dion, the Epaminodas, the Scipio of old, and I must think we are more deeply indebted to him than to all the ancient writers. Each of his "Lives" is a refutation to the despondency and cowardice of our religious and political theorists. A wild courage, a Stoicism not of the schools, but of the blood, shines in every anecdote, and had given that book immense fame.”

“Grief fills the room up of my absent child, Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me, Puts on his pretty look, repeats his words, Remembers me of his gracious parts, Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form”

“Remember thee!Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seatIn this distracted globe.”

“My rage is gone,And I am struck with sorrow. Take him up.Help, three o' th' chiefest soldiers; I'll be one.Beat thou the drum, that it speaks mournfully,Trail your steel spikes. Though in this city heHath widowed and unchilded many a one,Which to this hour bewail the injury,Yet he shall have a noble memory.Assist.”

“It is a tie between men to have read the same book.”

“There where the course is,Delight makes all of the one mind,The riders upon the galloping horses,The crowd that closes in behind.”

“There are days when the great are near us, when there is no frown on their brow, no condescension even; when they take us by the hand, and we share their thought.”

“Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let Time try.”

“Time, that takes survey of all the world,Must have a stop.”

“The time is out of joint.”