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Masculine observers, if the birth-mark did not heighten their admiration, contented themselves with wishing it away, that the world might possess one living specimen of ideal loveliness, without the semblance of a flaw.

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.
Living
Admiration
Heighten
Away
Flaws
Semblance
Might
Possess
Flaw
Without
Ideal
Contented
World
Ideals
Loveliness
Mark
Wishing
Birth
Observers
Wish
Masculine
Specimen

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Sunlight is painting.
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Every young sculptor seems to think that he must give the world some specimen of indecorous womanhood, and call it Eve, Venus, a Nymph, or any name that may apologize for a lack of decent clothing.
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To do nothing is the way to be nothing.
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Unquestionably we do stand by our national flag as stoutly as any people in the world and I myself have felt the heart-throb at sight of it, as sensibly as other men.
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If truth were everywhere to be shown, a scarlet letter would blaze forth on many a bosom.
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Keep the imagination sane--that is one of the truest conditions of communion with heaven.
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The divine chemistry works in the subsoil.
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Truth often finds its way to the mind close muffled in robes of sleep, and then speaks with uncompromising directness of matters in regard to which we practise an unconscious self-deception during our waking moments.
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Honesty and wisdom are such a delightful pastime, at another person's expense!
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The present is burdened too much with the past. We have not time, in our earthly existence, to appreciate what is warm with life, and immediately around us.
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As a general rule, Providence seldom vouchsafes to mortals any more than just that degree of encouragement which suffices to keep them at a reasonably full exertion of their powers.
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When an uninstructed multitude attempts to see with its eyes, it is exceedingly apt to be deceived.
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We are as happy as people can be, without making themselves ridiculous, and might be even happier but, as a matter of taste, we choose to stop short at this point.
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The love of science to rival the love of woman, in its depth and absorbing energy.
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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.
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Sunlight is like the breath of life to the pomp of autumn.
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Nothing is more unaccountable than the spell that often lurks in a spoken word. A thought may be present to the mind, and two minds conscious of the same thought, but as long as it remains unspoken their familiar talk flows quietly over the hidden idea.
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The love of posterity is the consequence of the necessity of death. If a man were sure of living forever here, he would not care about his offspring.
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Would Time but await the close of our favorite follies, we should all be young men, all of us, and until Doom's Day.
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Life, within doors, has few pleasanter prospects than a neatly-arranged and well-provisioned breakfast-table.
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