I am reading The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett at the moment and I very much liked this quote:
In the life of each of us, I said to myself, there is a place remote and islanded, and given to endless regret or secret happiness; we are each the uncompanioned hermit and recluse of an hour or a day; we understand our fellows of the cell to whatever age of history they may belong.
