Charlotte Brontë on forgiveness

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you.

If all the world hated you, and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved you, and absolved you from guilt, you would not be without friends.

Love, while always forgiving of imperfections and mistakes, can never cease to will their removal.

C. S. Lewis1898–1963

• Love
• Theology

To err is human, to forgive divine.

Alexander Pope1688–1744An Essay on Criticism (1711)In context

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heal that has crushed it.

Mark Twain1835–1910

• Virtue