Lucy Larcom

Whether rich or poor, a home is not a home unless the roots of love are ever striking deeper through the crust of the earthly and the conventional, into the very realities of being, not consciously always; seldom, perhaps; the simplicity of loving grows by living simply near nature and God.

If the world's a veil of tears, Smile till rainbows span it.

A friend is a beloved mystery; dearest always because he is not ourself, and has something in him which it is impossible for us to fathom. If it were not so, friendship would lose its chief zest.

From the first opening of our eyes, it is the light that attracts us. We clutch aimlessly with our baby fingers at the gossamer-motes in the sunbeam, and we die reaching out after an ineffable blending of earthly and heavenly beauty which we shall never fully comprehend.

What is the meaning of 'gossip?' Doesn't it originate with sympathy, an interest in one's neighbor, degenerating into idle curiosity and love of tattling? Which is worse, this habit, or keeping one's self so absorbed intellectually as to forget the sufferings and cares of others, to lose sympathy through having too much to think about?

A drop of water, if it could write out its own history, would explain the universe to us.

Whatever science and philosophy may do for mankind, the world can never outgrow its need of the simplicity that is in Christ.

No one can feel more gratefully the charm of noble scenery, or the refreshment of escape into the unspoiled solitudes of nature, than the laborer at some close in-door employment.

If the world seems cold to you, kindle fires to warm it.

Whatever with the past has gone the best is always yet to come.

He who plants a tree, plants a hope.