And so we should not only remember the dead, but also forgive the living. Just as we reach out our hand to the dead, across all graves, so we reach out to the living--across all hatred. And when we say: Honored be the dead, so we should add: And peace to all the living who are of goodwill.

Have I never understood you, Katherine? Have I been very selfish?' 'Yes ... You've asked her for sympathy, and she's not sympathetic; you've wanted her to be practical, and she's not practical.

I was fighting with Thoby on the lawn. We were pommelling each other with our fists. Just as I raised my fist to hit him, I felt: why hurt another person? I dropped my hand instantly, and stood there, and let him beat me. I remember the feeling. It was a feeling of hopeless sadness. It was as if I became aware of something terrible; and of my own powerlessness. I slunk off alone, feeling horribly depressed.

George Eliot makes us share their lives, not in a spirit of condescension or of curiosity, but in a spirit of sympathy. She is no satirist....But she gathers in her large grasp a great bunch of the main elements of human nature and groups them loosely together with a tolerant understanding which, as one finds upon re-reading, has not only kept her figures fresh and free, but has given them an unexpected hold upon our laughter and tears.

To know the truth—to accept without bitterness

That man, she thought, her anger rising in her, never gave; that man took.

Kindness in words creates confidence; kindness in thinking creates profoundness; kindness in giving creates love.

Certainly we struggle as victims of other people's unkindness. We have been sinned against. But we cannot excuse our sinful responses to others on the grounds of their mistreatment of us. We are responsible for what we do. We are both strugglers and sinners, victims and agents, people who hurt and people who harm.

Gran was just being polite. Southern people are supposed to be polite and gracious. She's trying to show me how to be the same way.

By the grace of God and by keeping busy making life better for others. That is how women always get through the hard parts of life.

Go, poor devil, get thee gone! Why should I hurt thee? This world surely is wide enough to hold both thee and me.

Only the brave know how to forgive…. A coward never forgave; it is not in his nature.