“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.”
- Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre
Sometimes, she reflected, she dressed for courage, sometimes for success, and sometimes for the consolation of knowing that whatever else went wrong, at least she liked her clothes.
- Emma Bull, War for the Oaks
Bravery never goes out of fashion.
- William Makepeace Thackery, Four Georges and the English Humourists
You must not let yourself become too respectable. Keep yourself a little wild. What is life for, if not for the living of it?
- Cynthia Voigt, The Callender Papers
Would it save you a lot of time if I just gave up and went mad now?
- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is that man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another.
- Homer, The Iliad
“I think I should have no other mortal wants, if I could always have plenty of music. It seems to infuse strength into my limbs, and ideas into my brain. Life seems to go on without effort, when I am filled with music.”
- George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss
Change begets change. Nothing propagates so fast.
- Charles Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit
“I shall take the heart,” returned the Tin Woodman; “for brains do not make one happy, and happiness is the best thing in the world.”
- L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
“A baby has brains, but it doesn’t know much. Experience is the only thing that brings knowledge, and the longer you are on earth the more experience you are sure to get.”
- L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
