Sarah Josepha Hale

There is hardly a more heart-thrilling pleasure enjoyed by mortals, than that which parents feel when seeing their child first being able to 'catch knowledge of objects.'

Americans have two ardent passions; the love of liberty, and love of distinction. These passions mutually stimulate and increase each other ; the enjoyment of equal rights as citizens giving every man a chance of becoming eminent, and that …

There is no influence so powerful as that of the mother. ... But next in rank and efficacy to that pure and holy source of moral influence, is that of the schoolmaster.

Her husband requested she would read, and she determined to read; her husband wished her to talk, and she resolved to talk. ... Then she had the habit into which your poor conversationalists usually fall, namely, asking questions.

A day of bliss is quickly told, A thousand would not make us old As one of sorrow doth— It is by cares, by woes and tears, We round the sum of human years——

Readers soon tire of prefaces, and skip them, and so the labor of writing them is lost.

All that I intended was, that self-control, in every station and to every individual, is indispensable, if people would retain that equanimity of mind, which depending on self-respect, is the essential of contentment and happiness.