This book is a collection of 152 fundamental quotes and aphorisms of Nathaniel Hawthorne:

"Easy reading is damn hard writing."

"I have not lived, but only dreamed about living."

"Happiness in this world, when it comes, comes incidentally. Make it the object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never attained. Follow some other object, and very possibly we may find that we have caught happiness without dreaming of it."

"Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you."

"Life is made up of marble and mud."

"Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind."