She doeth little kindnesses Which most leave undone, or despise. - James Russell Lowell

The real doth not clip the poet's wings,—
To win the secret of a weed’s plain heart
Reveals some clue to spiritual things,
And stumbling guess becomes firm-footed art.

Among the lessons taught by the French Revolution there is none sadder or more striking than this, that you may make everything else out of the passions of men except a political system that will work, and that there is nothing so pitilessly and unconsciously cruel as sincerity formulated into dogma.

The birch, most shy and lady-like of trees,
Her poverty, as best she may, retrieves,
And hints at her foregone gentilities
With some saved relics of her wealth of leaves.