"[5] Between 1872 and 1876, Palmer curated the 'Gray Engravings' (a collection of engravings bequeathed to Harvard College by Francis Calley Gray), which he proposed to have photographed and make generally available the prints "to foster the growing taste in the community for the higher forms of Art" (thereby serving as a precursor to Harvard's Open Collection Program), as well as that Harvard's "students will soon prefer these to the inane works which now decorate too many of their rooms".

[1] He said about ethics, "Right conduct consists in following one's conscience and doing one's duty for the sake of right and not for any ulterior purpose".

He wished to, "burn the pictures of heaven and quench the fires of hell that men might do right for the sake of the right.

[1] He also wrote The Field of Ethics (1901), The Nature of Goodness (1904), The Life and Works of George Herbert (three volumes, 1905), The Teacher (1908), Intimations of Immortality in the Sonnets of Shakespeare (1912), and Trades and Professions (1914).

[8] Between 1894 and 1909, Palmer received honorary LL.D degrees from the University of Michigan, Union, Dartmouth, and Harvard.

[1][3] On December 23, 1887, he married, as his second wife, Alice Freeman Palmer, who was the president of Wellesley College.

They both pursued their individual careers, and George contributed efforts to managing the household, particularly when she was at the University of Chicago during her post there as dean of women.

He died on May 7, 1933, at 91 years of age[2][8] and his ashes were buried with his wife's at the Houghton Chapel of Wellesley College.