Ann Rinaldi

“When a woman's face is wrinkledAnd her hairs are sprinkled, With gray, Lackaday!Aside she's cast, No one respect will pay;Remember, Lasses, remember.And while the sun shines make hay:You must not expect in December, The flowers you gathered in May.”

“The people who founded America, who fought for its freedom, did not look to anyone else to get them out of their troubles. They took matters into their own hands and answered only to God and their peers. In today's world, sacrifice and hardship are not in the everyday language, and instant gratification is foremost.”

“Our enemies make us strong, Miss Muffet, not our friends. Our friends will lie to us, tell us what we need to hear. Forgive us. We must keep a few good enemies on hand, always, to keep us sharp and teach us never to do anything that needs forgiveness.”

“Words said can never be recalled. So it is best, oftimes, not to speak too quickly. Yet words left unsaid are worse. We wear them like weights around our hearts.”

“As a child growing up in World War II, I was very moved and stirred by what was going on, but I distanced myself from history. I regarded history as just one more subject.”

“The house was so quiet, as if everyone had been spirited out of sight. I had a feeling of moving through time itself. I saw myself as a small, scurrying animal rushing into my future. But I was not afraid.”

“I think everyone should read Governor William Bradford's diary.”

“You don't trade in the devil you know for the one you don't know.”

“Haven't my past sermons taught you anyt”

“Little things about the Pilgrims surprised me. For instance, the fact that the first duel in America was fought at Plymouth by two teenaged boys over a girl. The life the Pilgrims led in Holland before coming to America also surprised me.”

“I didn't know how to say goodbye. Words were stupid. They said so little. Yet they opened up holes you could fall into and never climb out of again.”

“He is not a punishing God, Lizzy. That is the mistake most people make, thinking He sits with an account book and a big fist, waiting to punish us. He is not a wrathful God but a loving God who made each of us and loved us since we were in our mother’s womb”

“I find American girls have a spirit and honesty about them that is most refreshing.”