Many...have learned that the magnitude of lives is not as to their external displacements, but as to their subjective experiences. The impressionable… - Thomas Hardy

it is difficult to adjust our outer and inner life with perfect honesty to all!

...what I appear, a sick and poor man, is not the worst of me. I am in a chaos of principles — groping in the dark — acting by instinct and not after example. Eight or nine years ago when I came here first, I had a neat stock of fixed opinions, but they dropped away one by one; and the further I get the less sure I am. I doubt if I have anything more for my present rule of life than following inclinations which do me and nobody else any harm, and actually give pleasure to those I love best.

Honour'd Sir — Look to your Wife if you do love her as much as she do love you. For she is sore put to by an Enemy in the shape of a Friend. Sir, there is one near her who ought to be Away. A woman should not be try'd beyond her Strength, and continual dropping will wear away a Stone — ay, more — a Diamond. From Two Well-Wishers