Books let us into their souls and lay open to us the secrets of our own.

More from "The Sick Chamber," The New Monthly Magazine (August 1830)

• All that is worth remembering in life, is the poetry of it.
• Do not keep on with a mockery of friendship after the substance is gone — but part, while you can part friends. Bury the carcass of friendship: it is not worth embalming.
• Grace has been defined the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.
• Grace is the absence of every thing that indicates pain or difficulty, or hesitation or incongruity.
• Great thoughts reduced to practice become great acts.
• If we wish to know the force of human genius, we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insignificance of human learning, we may study his commentators.