Sarah Orne Jewett Quotes

When I went in again the little house had suddenly grown lonely, and my room looked empty as it had the day I came. I and all my belongings had died out of it, and I knew how it would seem when Mrs. Todd came back and found her lodger gone. So we die before our own eyes; so we see some chapters of our lives come to their natural end.

Yes'm, old friends is always best, 'less you can catch a new one that's fit to make an old one out of.

It is in human nature to respect power; but all his
manliness was at stake, and his natural rights would be degraded and lost, if he could not show his power to be greater than her own.

In the life of each of us, I said to myself, there is a place remote and islanded, and given to endless regret or secret happiness.

There, don't you think I'm always a-fault-finding! When I get hold of the real thing in folks, I stick to 'em, — but there's an awful sight of poor material walking about that ain't worth the ground it steps on.

Man has done his best to ruin the world he lives in.

It is not one’s surroundings that can help or hinder – it is having a growing purpose in one’s life to make the most of whatever is in one’s reach. If you have but a few good books, learn those to the very heart of them. Don’t for one moment believe that if you had different surroundings and opportunities you would find the upward path any easier to climb. One condition is like another, if you have not the determination and the power to grow in yourself.

We who were her neighbors were full of gayety, which was but the reflected light from her beaming countenance. It was not the first time that I was full of wonder at the waste of human ability in this world, as a botanist wonders at the wastefulness of nature, the thousand seeds that die, the unused provision of every sort. The reserve force of society grows more and more amazing to one's thought.

A harbor, even if it is a little harbor, is a good thing, since adventurers come into it as well as go out, and the life in it grows strong, because it takes something from the world, and has something to give in return.

The warm sun kissed the earth To consecrate thy birth, And from his close embrace Thy radiant face Sprang into sight, A blossoming delight.

Do you know that I have understood something lately better than I ever did before — it is that success and happiness are not things of chance with us, but of choice. I can see how we might so easily have had a dull summer here. Of course it is our own fault if the events of our lives are hindrances; it is we who make them bad or good. Sometimes it is a conscious choice, but oftener unconscious. I suppose we educate ourselves for taking the best of life or the worst, do not you?

The bright flower was like a face. Somehow, the beauty and life of it were surprising in the plain room, like a gay little child who might suddenly appear in a doorway.

It does seem so pleasant to talk with an old acquaintance that knows what you know. I see so many of these new folks nowadays, that seem to have neither past nor future. Conversation's got to have some root in the past, or else you've got to explain every remark you make, an' it wears a person out.

There is all the pleasure that one can have in golddigging in finding one’s hopes satisfied in the riches of a good hill of potatoes.

T’aint’ no use to look for public sperit ‘less you’ve got some yourself.