Catherine Helen Spence Quotations

Nothing is insignificant in the history of a young community, and - above all - nothing seems impossible.

I had only two offers of marriage in my life, and I refused both.

I count myself well educated, for the admirable woman at the head of the school which I attended from the age of four and a half till I was thirteen and a half, was a born teacher in advance of her own times.

After the break up of the municipality and the loss of his income my father lost health and spirits.

As we grew to love South Australia, we felt that we were in an expanding society, still feeling the bond to the motherland, but eager to develop a perfect society in the land of our adoption.

A glass of whisky in Scotland in the thirties cost less than a cup of tea.

The Town Clerkship, however, was the means of giving me a lesson in electoral methods.

The first issue of The Register was printed in London, and gave a glowing account of the province that was to be - its climate, its resources, the sound principles on which it was founded.

Even before the discovery of copper South Australia had turned the corner.

I had seen Adelaide the dearest and the cheapest place to live in.

I think I was well brought up, for my father and mother were of one mind regarding the care of the family.

South Australia was the first community to give the secret ballot for political elections.

I had learned what wealth was, and a great deal about production and exchange for myself in the early history of South Australia - of the value of machinery, of roads and bridges, and of ports for transport and export.

Our South Australian farmers left their holdings in the hands of their wives and children too young to take with them, but almost all of them returned to grow grain and produce to send to Victoria.

My brothers went to the parish school, one of the best in the county.

My pamphlet did not set the Torrens on fire.

My return to London introduced me to a wider range of society.

Drinking habits were very prevalent among men, and were not in any way disgraceful, unless excessive.

Probably my mother's life was prolonged beyond that of a long-lived family by her coming to Australia in middle life; and if I ever had any tendency to consumption, the climate must have helped me.

There is nothing so costly to the state as a ruined life

I look back to a happy childhood.

I think my brother John profited less by the great advance of South Australia than he deserved for sticking to the Bank of South Australia.

But more important than all this was the fact that we took hold of the growth and development of South Australia, and identified ourselves with it.

Although my mother had the greatest love for Sir Walter Scott, and the highest appreciation of his poems and novels, she never liked Melrose.

In all my travels and visits I saw little of the theatre or concert room, and some of the candid confessions of Mrs. Oliphant might stand for my own.