I am 'too fiery' … yet I wish to be seen as I am, and would lose all rather than soften away anything. - Margaret Fuller

All around us lies what we neither understand nor use. Our capacities, our instincts for this our present sphere are but half developed. Let us confine ourselves to that till the lesson be learned; let us be completely natural; before we trouble ourselves with the supernatural. I never see any of these things but I long to get away and lie under a green tree and let the wind blow on me. There is marvel and charm enough in that for me.

Be to the best thou knowest ever true, Is all the creed; Then, by thy talisman of rosy hue, Or fenced with thorns that wearing thou must bleed, Or gentle pledge of Love's prophetic view, The faithful steps it will securely lead. Happy are all who reach that shore, And bathe in heavenly day, Happiest are those who high the banner bore, To marshal others on the way; Or waited for them, fainting and way-worn, By burdens overborne.

I have a vague expectation of some crisis, — I know not what. But it has long seemed, that, in the year 1850, I should stand on a plateau in the ascent of life, where I should be allowed to pause for a while, and take more clear and commanding views than ever before. Yet my life proceeds as regularly as the fates of a Greek tragedy, and I can but accept the pages as they turn.