[Y]our letter—your dear, warm, true-hearted letter — was put in my hand. I kissed it how many times before breaking its envelope! – Byron Caldwell Smith, letter to Kate Stephens

I have received no more than one or two letters in my life that were worth the postage. – Henry David Thoreau, Walden

We lay aside letters never to read them again, and at last we destroy them out of discretion, and so disappears the most beautiful, the most immediate breath of life, irrecoverable for ourselves and for others. – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe