Quotes from E.D.E.N. Southworth

Ah, it is impossible." "No, it is only very difficult - so very difficult that I shall be sure to accomplish it!

There are some persons whom we can never make happy. It is not in them to be so.

Catch me coming to my senses, when it's so delightful to be mad. I'm too sharp for that.

Freedom and peace is even sweeter than wealth and honors.

There is some advantage in having imagination, since that visionary faculty opens the mental eyes to facts that more practical and duller intellects could never see.

But, my dear, if you should be caught out in the storm!" "Why, I don't know but I should like it! What harm could it do? I'm not soluble in water - rain won't melt me away! I think upon the whole I rather prefer being caught in the storm," said Cap, perversely.

I wonder how long they'll keep me here? Forever, I hope. Until I get cured. I hope they won't cure me; I vow I won't be cured. It's a great deal too pleasant to be mad, and I'll stay so.

Now, the soul of Capitola naturally abhorred sentiment. If ever she gave way to serious emotion, she was sure to avenge herself by being more capricious than before.

Fie on it! Cowardice is worse than death!

It was your destiny - let us hope it will prove a glorious one.

Things difficult - almost to impossibility - can always be accomplished. Write that upon your tablets, for it is a valuable truth.

It means, your worships' excellencies, that - you - can't come to it! This chicken won't fight. It means that the fat's in the fire, and the cat's out of the bag! It means confusion! Distraction! Perdition! And a tearing off of our wigs! It means the game's up, the play's over, villainy is about to be hanged and virtue about to be married, and the curtain is going to drop and the principal performer - that's I - is going to be called out amid the applause of the audience!

And no sooner had Cap been commanded, if she valued her safety, not to cross the water or climb the precipice than, as a natural consequence, she began to wonder what was in the valley behind the mountain and what might be in the woods across the river. And she longed, above all things, to explore and find out for herself.

Be silent!" shrieked the beldame. "I won't!" said Cap. "Because you see, if we are in for the horrible, I can beat you hollow at that!

gentle admonition." "Gentle admonition! Do you call that gentle admonition? Why, uncle, you are enough to frighten most people to death with your fury. You are a perfect dragon! a griffin! a Russian bear! a Bengal tiger! a Numidian lion! You're all Barnum's beasts in one! I declare, if I don't write and ask him to send a party down here to catch you for his museum!

It means that you two, precious father and son, would be a pair of knaves if you had sense enough; but, failing in that, you are only a pair of fools!

You don't like this quite country life?" inquired Mrs. Condiment. "No; no better than I do a quiet country grave-yard. I don't want to return to dust before my time, I tell you," said Cap, yawning dismally over her work.

Ah! The transitory joy of the past week had been but the lightning's arrowy course scathing where it illumined!

Lad, there are other starvations besides the total lack of food. There are slow starvations and divers ones. - Doctor Day

Go! Go! Go! Go!' said that officer, with an expression as though he considered our Cap an individual of the animal kingdom whom neither Buffon nor any other natural philosopher had ever classified, and who, as a creature of unknown habits, might sometimes be dangerous.

The mother smiled at his earnestness - smiled without the least misgiving; for, to her apprehension, the youth was still a boy, to wonder at and admire beauty, without being in the least danger of having his peace of mind disturbed by love.

There is not such a man as the doctor appears in this world more than once in a hundred years.

You are like the angel in Cole's picture of life! You point the youth to the far-up temple of fame-" "And leave him to get there as he can? Not at all, madam!

Big streams from little fountains flow. Great oaks from little acorns grow;