Fancies are like shadows…you can’t cage them, they’re such wayward, dancing things.

I feel as if something has been torn suddenly out of my life and left a terrible hole. I feel as if I couldn’t be I — as if I must have changed into somebody...

Changes come all the time. Just as soon as things get really nice they change,’ she said with a sigh.

Mrs. Allan’s face was not the face of the girlbride whom the minister had brought to Avonlea five years before. It had lost some of its bloom and youthful curves, and there were fine, patient...

He smiled his shy smile at her as he went into the yard. Anne took the memory of it with her when she went to her room that night and sat for a long while...

Mrs. Lynde says, ‘Blessed are they who expect nothing for they shall not be disappointed.

The sorrows God sent us brought comfort and strength with them, while the sorrows we brought on ourselves, through folly or wickedness, were by far the hardest to bear.

The woods are never solitary–they are full of whispering, beckoning, friendly life. But the sea is a mighty soul, forever moaning of some great, unshareable sorrow, which shuts it up into itself for all eternity.

I’d like to add some beauty to life,” said Anne dreamily. “I don’t exactly want to make people KNOW more… though I know that IS the noblest ambition… but I’d love to make them have...

I suppose that’s how it looks in prose. But it’s very different if you look at it through poetry…and I think it’s nicer…’ Anne recovered herself and her eyes shone and her cheeks flushed… ‘to...

[…] I grew up out of that strange, dreamy childhood of mine and went into the world of reality. I met with experiences that bruised my spirit – but they never harmed my ideal world....

I’m going home to an old country farmhouse, once green, rather faded now, set among leafless apple orchards. There is a brook below and a December fir wood beyond, where I’ve heard harps swept by...

We are never half so interesting when we have learned that language is given us to enable us to conceal our thoughts.

Good night, belovedest. Your sleep will be sweet if there is any influences in the wishes of your own.

In this life you’ve got to hope for the best, prepare for the worst and take whatever God sends.

[speaking of a friend named Lavendar Lewis] ‘I think her parents gave her the only right and fitting name that could possibly be given her,’ said Anne. ‘If they had been so blind as to...

March came in that winter like the meekest and mildest of lambs, bringing days that were crisp and golden and tingling, each followed by a frosty pink twilight which gradually lost itself in an elfland...

But I’ll have to ask you to wait a long time, Anne,” said Gilbert sadly. “It will be three years before I’ll finish my medical course. And even then there will be no diamond sunbursts...

…And every day in heaven will be more beautiful than the one before it Davy,” assured Anne.

Lovely thoughts came flying to meet me like birds. They weren’t my thoughts. I couldn’t think anything half so exquisite. They came from somewhere.

…hate’s got to be a disease with me.

Don’t give up all your romance, Anne,” he whispered shyly, “a little bit is a good thing – not too much, of course, but keep a little of it, Anne, keep a little of it.

Anne reveled in the world of color about her.”Oh, Marilla,” she exclaimed one Saturday morning, coming dancing in with her arms full of gorgeous boughs, “I’m so glad I live in a world where there...

If the bards of old the true has toldThe sirens have raven hair.But over the earth since art had birth,They paint the angels fair.

Anne laughed.”I don’t want sunbursts or marble halls, I just want you.

My pen shall heal, not hurt.

We’ve had a beautiful friendship, Diana. We’ve never marred it by one quarrel or coolness or unkind word; and I hope it will always be so. But things can’t be quite the same after this....

I couldn’t sew on a day like this. There’s something in the air that gets in the blood and makes a sort of glory in my soul. My fingers would twitch and I’d sew a...

…determined to enjoy her luxury of grief uncomforted.

Heaven must be very beautiful, of course, the Bible says so — but, Anne, it won’t be what I’ve been used to.

You mayn’t get the things themselves; but nothing can prevent you from having the fun of looking forward to them. Mrs. Lynde says, ‘Blessed are they who expect nothing for they shall not be disappointed.’...

Don’t you know that it is only the very foolish folk who talk sense all the time? (Anne)

Oh, it’s delightful to have ambitions. I’m so glad I have such a lot. And there never seems to be any end to them– that’s the best of it. Just as soon as you attain...

Next to trying and winning, the best thing is trying and failing.

Why must people kneel down to pray? If I really wanted to pray I’ll tell you what I’d do. I’d go out into a great big field all alone or in the deep, deep woods...

She had dreamed some brilliant dreams during the past winter and now they lay in the dust around her. In her present mood of self-disgust, she could not immediately begin dreaming again. And she discovered...

When I think something nice is going to happen I seem to fly right up on the wings of anticipation; and then the first thing I realize I drop down to earth with a thud....

Desire grows by what it feeds on.

A woman who has a sense of humor possesses no refuge from the merciless truth about herself. She cannot think herself misunderstood. She cannot revel in self-pity. She cannot comfortably damn any one who differs...

That’s all the freedom we can hope for – the freedom to choose our prison.

I don’t believe Old Nick can be so very ugly,’ said Aunt Jamesina reflectively. ‘He wouldn’t do so much harm if he was. I always think of him as a rather handsome gentleman.

All in all, it was a never-to-be-forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life, but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers...

The little things of life, sweet and excellent in their place, must not be the things lived for; the highest must be sought and followed; the life of heaven must be begun here on earth.

How terrible it must be not to see and feel beauty…. I’m so glad I can find happiness in all lovely little things… It seems to me that every time I look out of a...

I can always get through to-day very nicely. It’s to-morrow I can’t live through

I suppose all this sounds very crazy — all these terrible emotions always do sound foolish when we put them into our inadequate words. They are not meant to be spoken — only felt and...

It must be lovely to be grown up, Marilla, when just being treated as if you were is so nice…Well, anyway, when I grow up, I’m always going to talk to little girls as if...

November is usually such a disagreeable month…as if the year had suddenly found out that she was growing old and could do nothing but weep and fret over it. This year is growing old gracefully…just...

Anne looked at the white young mother with a certain awe that had never entered into her feelings for Diana before. Could this pale woman with the rapture in her eyes be the little black-curled,...

And if you couldn’t be loved, the next best thing was to be let alone.