Quote

It is to the credit of human nature, that, except where its selfishness is brought into play, it loves more readily than it hates. Hatred, by a gradual and quiet process, will even be transformed to love, unless the change be impeded by a continually new irritation of the original feeling of hostility.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

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Nathaniel Hawthorne
Age: 59 †
Born: 1804
Born: July 4
Died: 1864
Died: May 18
Diplomat
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Salem
Massachusetts
Nathaniel Hathorne
Monsieur de l'Aubépine
N. H.
Change
Except
Transformed
Scarlet
Human
Quiet
Originals
Irritation
Humans
Unless
Original
Gradual
Play
Feeling
Credit
Readily
Even
Process
Loves
Hates
Love
Hate
Anger
Hostility
Feelings
Hatred
Continually
Nature
Brought
Selfishness
Impeded

More quotes by Nathaniel Hawthorne

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No summer ever came back, and no two summers ever were alike. Times change, and people change and if our hearts do not change as readily, so much the worse for us.
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The breath of peace was fanning her glorious brow, her head was bowed a very little forward, and a tress, escaping from its bonds, fell by the side of her pure white temple, and close to her just opened lips it hung there motionless! no breath disturbed its repose! She slept as an angel might sleep, having accomplished the mission of her God.
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It is not good for man to cherish a solitary ambition. Unless there be those around him, by whose example he may regulate himself, his thoughts, desires, and hopes will become extravagant, and he the semblance, perhaps the reality, of a madman
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Nobody will use other people's experience, nor have any of his own till it is too late to use it.
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I do detest all offices - all, at least, that are held on a political tenure.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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It is a little remarkable, that - though disinclined to talk overmuch of myself and my affairs at the fireside, and to my personal friends - an autobiographical impulse should twice in my life have taken possession of me, in addressing the public.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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The heart of true womanhood knows where its own sphere is, and never seeks to stray beyond it!
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The greatest possible mint of style is to make the words absolutely disappear into the thought.
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Every individual has a place to fill in the world and is important in some respect whether he chooses to be so or not.
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Happiness is like a butterfly.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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I have come to see the nonsense of attempting to describe fine scenery. There is no such possibility. If scenery could be adequately reproduced in words, there would have been no need of God's making it in reality.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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A man's bewilderment is the measure of his wisdom.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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I wonder that we Americans love our country at all, it having no limits and no oneness and when you try to make it a matter of the heart, everything falls away except one's native State -neither can you seize hold of that, unless you tear it out of the Union, bleeding and quivering.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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What is the voice of song when the world lacks the ear of taste?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Last night, there came a frost, which has done great damage to my garden.... It is sad that Nature will play such tricks on us poor mortals, inviting us with sunny smiles to confide in her, and then, when we are entirely within her power, striking us to the heart.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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If truth were everywhere to be shown, a scarlet letter would blaze forth on many a bosom.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Though we speak nonsense, God will pick out the meaning of it.
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A screen... the scenery and the figures of life were perfectly represented, but with that bewitching, yet indescribably difference, which always makes a picture, an image, or a shadow, so much more attractive than the original.
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Easy reading is damn hard writing.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Methinks it is a token of healthy and gentle characteristics, when women of high thoughts and accomplishments love to sew especially as they are never more at home with their own hearts than while so occupied.
Nathaniel Hawthorne