Are the days of winter sunshine just as sad for you, too? When it is misty, in the evenings, and I am out walking by myself, it seems to me that the rain is falling through my heart and causing it to crumble into ruins. – Gustave Flaubert
Human speech is like a cracked cauldron on which we bang out tunes that make bears dance, when what we want is to move the stars to pity. – Gustave Flaubert
To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost. – Gustave Flaubert
I have the handicap of being born with a special language to which I alone have the key. – Gustave Flaubert
Our destiny often looks like a fruit-tree in winter. Who would think from its pitiable aspect that those rigid boughs, those rough twigs could next spring again be green, bloom, and even bear fruit? Yet we hope it, we know it. – Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Wilhelm Meister’s Travels, translated from German
Nature looks dead in winter because her life is gathered into her heart. She withers the plant down to the root that she may grow it up again fairer and stronger. She calls her family together within her inmost home to prepare them for being scattered abroad upon the face of the earth. – Hugh Macmillan, “Rejuvenescence,” The Ministry of Nature, 1871
He who marvels at the beauty of the world in summer will find equal cause for wonder and admiration in winter…. In winter the stars seem to have rekindled their fires, the moon achieves a fuller triumph, and the heavens wear a look of a more exalted simplicity. – John Burroughs, “The Snow-Walkers,” 1866
I was a sickly baby, and after two sets of adoptive parents took me home, they returned me to the orphanage because of a serious respiratory infection. But as they say, the third times a charm, because my mom and dad adopted me and took me into their home where I was raised in a family full of love. – Rodney Atkins