First," he said, "if you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you'll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view--until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.

— Harper Lee

He might have hurt me a little,' Atticus conceded, 'but SN, you'll understand folks a little better when you're older. A mob's always made up of people, no matter what. Mr Cunningham was part of a mob last night, but he WS still a man. Every mob in every little Southern town is always made up of people you know - doesn't say much for them, does it?'' I'll say OT,' said Jem.' So it took an eight-year-old child to bring 'em to their senses, didn't it?' said Atticus. 'That proves something - that a gang of wild animals can be stopped, simply because they're still human. HMP, maybe we need a police force of children.

— Harper Lee

He was letting you break your icons one by one. He was letting you reduce him to the status of a human being.

— Harper Lee

Honey, the sun rises and sets with that Bill of hers. Everything he says is Gospel. She loves her man."" Is that what loving your man is?"" Has a lot to do with it." Jean Louise said, "You mean losing your own identity, don't you?"" In a way, yes," said Henry. "Then I doubt if I shall ever marry.

— Harper Lee

How could this be so, I wondered, as I read Mr. Underwood's editorial. Senseless killing--Tom had been given due process of law to the day of his death; he had been tried openly and convicted by twelve good men and true; my father had fought for him all the way. Then Mr. Underwood's meaning became clear: Atticus had used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in the secret courts of men's hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed.

— Harper Lee

I do my best to love everybody... I'm hard put,sometimes-baby, its never an insult o be called what somebody thinks is a bad name. It just shows you how poor that person is, it doesn't hurt you.

— Harper Lee

I do wish this time you'd try to dress better while you're home. Folks in town get the wrong impression of you. They think you are--ah--slumming.

— Harper Lee

I'd rather you shot at tin cans in the backyard, but I know you'll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird..... Mockingbirds don't do one thing to but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up people's garden, don't nest in corn cribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird.

— Harper Lee

If a man says to you, "This is the truth," and you believe him, and you discover what he says is not the truth, you are disappointed, and you make sure you will not be caught by him again. But a man who has lived the truth--and you have believed in what he has lived--he does not leave you merely wary when he fails you, he leaves you with nothing.

— Harper Lee

If a man says to you, "This is the truth," and you believe him, and you discover what he says is not the truth, you are disappointed, and you make sure you will not be caught out by him again. But a man who has lived by the truth-and you have believed in what he has lived-he does not leave you merely wary when he fails you, he leaves you with nothing.

— Harper Lee