The reduction of the universe to a single being, the expansion of a single being even to God, that is love.

If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.

Listen to them—the children of the night; what music they make! The wolves are not to me as they are to other men. To them the night is freedom and food; to me it is kinship and home, and I have learned to love their voices as a man loves his own blood.

I have loved you long; I shall love you long: while I live and, if there is mercy, after.

Has the sun done anything for me? No; he warms me with his rays, and it is by his light that I see you—nothing more.

He shall never know how I love him; and that, not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am.

Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton’s is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.

You had brought me something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what love really is… Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows… Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see that.

Every atom of your flesh is as dear to me as my own: in pain and sickness it would still be dear. Your mind is my treasure, and if it were broken, it would be my treasure still; … whatever your faults, they were not invented: I would not have a part of you altered, any more than I would have a single feature changed in my face.

I ask you to pass through life at my side—to be my second self, and best earthly companion.

You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.