"life and love are very precious when both are in full bloom."
"…feeling as if all the happiness and support of their lives was about to be taken from them."
"John Brooke is acting dreadfully, and Meg likes it!"
"I have nothing to give but my heart so full and these empty hands.""They're not empty now."
"…wisely mingled poetry and prose."
"Be comforted, dear soul! There is always light behind the clouds."
"I think she is growing up, and so begins to dream dreams, and have hopes and fears and fidgets, without knowing why or being able to explain them."
"I wish I had a horse; then I could run for miles in this splendid air, and not lose my breath." Jo"
"In her secret soul, however, she decided that politics were as bad as mathematics, and that the mission of politicians seemed to be calling each other names…"
"Don't laugh at the spinsters, dear girls, for often very tender, tragic romances are hidden away in the hearts that beat so quietly under the sober gowns, and many silent sacrifices of youth, health, ambition, love itself, make the faded faces beautiful in God's sight. Even the sad, sour sisters should be kindly dealt with, because they have missed the sweetest part of life, if for no other reason."
"Right Jo better be happy old maids than unhappy wives or unmaidenly girls running about to find husbands."
"Gentlemen, be courteous to the old maids, no matter how poor and plain and prim, for the only chivalry worth having is that which is the readiest to to pay deference to the old, protect the feeble, and serve womankind, regardless of rank, age, or color."
"…on some occasions, women, like dreams, go by contraries."
"Amy's lecture did Laurie good, though, of course, he did not own it till long afterward. Men seldom do, for when women are the advisers, the lords of creation don't take the advice till they have persuaded themselves that it is just what they intended to do. Then they act upon it, and, if it succeeds, they give the weaker vessel half the credit of it. If it fails, they generously give her the whole."
"It’s genius simmering, perhaps. I’ll let it simmer, and see what comes of it,” he said, with a secret suspicion all the while that it wasn’t genius, but something far more common. Whatever it was, it simmered to some purpose, for he grew more and more discontented with his desultory life, began to long for some real and earnest work to go at, soul and body, and finally came to the wise conclusion that everyone who loved music was not a composer."
"The humblest tasks get beautified if loving hands do them."
"If you feel your value lies in being merely decorative, I fear that someday you might find yourself believing that’s all that you really are. Time erodes all such beauty, but what it cannot diminish is the wonderful workings of your mind: Your humor, your kindness, and your moral courage. These are the things I cherish so in you. I so wish I could give my girls a more just world. But I know you’ll make it a better place. - Marmee"
"Go on with your work as usual, for work is a blessed solace."
"It’s bad enough to be a girl, anyway, when I like boys’ games and work and manners!"
"…marriage, they say, halves one's rights and doubles one's duties."
"[Jo to her mother] I knew there was mischief brewing. I felt it and now it's worse than I imagined. I just wish I could marry Meg myself, and keep her safe in the family."
"I wish I had no heart, it aches so…"
"Because they are mean is no reason why I should be. I hate such things, and though I think I've a right to be hurt, I don't intend to show it. (Amy March)"
"You are like a chestnut burr, prickly outside, but silky-soft within, and a sweet kernel, if one can only get at it. Love will make you show your heart some day, and then the rough burr will fall off."
"…nothing remained but loneliness and grief…"