"If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week."

"Nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult—at least I have found it so—than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind."

"But I am very poorly today & very stupid & I hate everybody & everything. One lives only to make blunders."

"Man, with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his god-like intellect…"

"I am almost convinced (quite contrary to opinion I started with) that species are not (it is like confessing a murder) immutable."