frances-hodgson-burnett

Perhaps you can feel if you can__ hear,_ was her fancy. __erhaps kind thoughts reach people somehow, even through windows and doors and walls. Perhaps you feel a little warm and comforted, and don__ know why, when I am standing here in the cold and hoping you will get well and happy again.

To let a sad thought or a bad one get into your mind is as dangerous as letting a scarlet fever germ get into your body. If you let it stay there after it has got in you may never get over it as long as you live.

How it is that animals understand things I do not know, but it is certain that they do understand. Perhaps there is a language which is not made of words and everything in the world understands it. Perhaps there is a soul hidden in everything and it can always speak, without even making a sound, to another soul.

Whatever comes," she said, "cannot alter one thing. If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it.

I dare say it is rather hard to be a rat,_ she mused. __obody likes you. People jump and run away and scream out: __h, a horrid rat!_ I shouldn__ like people to scream and jump and say: __h, a horrid Sara!_ the moment they saw me, and set traps for me, and pretend they were dinner. It__ so different to be a sparrow. But nobody asked this rat if he wanted to be a rat when he was made. Nobody said: __ouldn__ you rather be a sparrow?