The House of the Seven Gables (Signet Classics)

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

People in difficulty and distress, or in any manner at odds with the world, can endure a vast amount of harsh treatment, and perhaps be only the stronger for it; whereas they give way at once before the simplest expression of what they perceive to be genuine sympathy.

I find nothing so singular in life as that everything appears to lose its substance the instant one actually grapples with it.

She appeared to be walking in a dream; or, more truly, the vivid life and reality assumed by her emotions made all outward occurrences unsubstantial, like the teasing phantasms of a half-conscious slumber.

Is not the world sad enough, in genuine earnest, without making a pastime of mock sorrows?

I’m one of those people who think that infinity is big enough for us all—and eternity long enough.”

Might and wrong combined, like iron magnetized, are endowed with irresistible attraction.

What he needed was the love of a very few; not the admiration, or even the respect, of the unknown many.