S. Austin Allibone, comp. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. 1880.
Charlotte Brontë
Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs. We are, and must be, one and all, burdened with faults in this world; but the time will come when, I trust, we shall put them off in putting off our corruptible bodies: when debasement and sin will fall from us with this cumbrous frame of flesh, and only the spark will remain,—the impalpable principle of life and thought, pure as when it left the Creator to inspire the creature: whence it came, it will return, perhaps to pass through gradations of glory,—from the pale human soul to brighten to the seraph…. It is a creed in which I delight, to which I cling. It makes eternity a rest, a mighty home, not a terror and an abyss. Besides, with this creed revenge never worries my heart, degradation never too deeply disgusts me, injustice never crushes me too low: I live in calm, looking to the end.