We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we? Edith Wharton More Quotes by Edith Wharton More Quotes From Edith Wharton For hours she had lain in a kind of gentle torpor, not unlike that sweet lassitude which masters one in the hush of a midsummer noon, when the heat seems to have silenced the very birds and insects, and, lying sunk in the tasselled meadow grasses, one looks up through a level roofing of maple-leaves at the vast, shadowless, and unsuggestive blue. Edith Wharton bluesweetlying In the rotation of crops there was a recognized season for wild oats; but they were not sown more than once. Edith Wharton cropsoatsrotation It was the old New York way...the way people who dreaded scandal more than disease, who placed decency above courage, and who considered that nothing was more ill-bred than "scenes", except those who gave rise to them. Edith Wharton diseasenew-yorkpeople Apart from the pleasure of looking at her and listening to her-of enjoying in her what others less discriminatingly but as liberally appreciated-he had the sense, between himself and her, of a kind of free-masonry of precocious tolerance and irony. They had both, in early youth, taken the measure of the world they happened to live in: they knew just what it was worth to them and for what reasons, and the community of these reasons lent to their intimacy its last exquisite touch. Edith Wharton tolerancecommunitytaken To have you here, you mean-in reach and yet out of reach? To meet you in this way, on the sly? It's the very reverse of what I want. Edith Wharton wantmeanway Most timidities have such secret compensations and Miss Bart was discerning enough to know that the inner vanity is generally in proportion to the outer self depreciation. Edith Wharton vanityselfmissing The essence of taste is suitability. Divest the word of its prim and priggish implications, and see how it expresses the mysterious demand of the eye and mind for symmetry, harmony and order. Edith Wharton eyeessenceorder ...I have always lived on contrasts! To me the only death is monotony. Beware of monotony; it's the mother of all the deadly sins. Edith Wharton monotonysinmother I've always shrunk from usurping the functions of Providence, and when I have to exercise them I decidedly prefer that it shouldn't be on an errand of destruction. Edith Wharton errandsdestructionexercise Don't they always go from bad to worse? There's no turning back--your old self rejects you, and shuts you out. ~Lilly Bart Edith Wharton no-turning-backrejects-youself In a sky of iron the points of the Dipper hung like icicles and Orion flashed his cold fires. Edith Wharton starsfiresky The real alchemy consists in being able to turn gold back again into something else; and that's the secret that most of your friends have lost. Edith Wharton realgoldsecret Life is either always a tight-rope or a featherbed. Give me a tight-rope. Edith Wharton inspirationalgivinglife Yes, you have been away a very long time.' 'Oh, centuries and centuries; so long,' she said, 'that I'm sure I'm dead and buried and this dear old place is heaven. Edith Wharton centuryheavenlong If I could have made the change sooner I daresay I should never have given a thought to the literary delights of Paris or London; for life in the country is the only state which has always completely satisfied me, and I had never been allowed to gratify it, even for a few weeks at a time. Now I was to know the joys of six or seven months a year among fields and woods of my own, and the childish ecstasy of that first spring outing at Mamaroneck swept away all restlessness in the deep joy of communion with the earth. Edith Wharton springcountryyears The visible world is a daily miracle, for those who have eyes and ears. Edith Wharton miracleeyeears Her vivid smile was like a light held up to dazzle me. Edith Wharton vividsmilelight I swear I only want to hear about you, to know what you've been doing. It's a hundred years since we've met-it may be another hundred before we meet again. Edith Wharton wantmayyears I'm not much interested in travelling scholarships for women - or in fact in scholarships, tout court! - they'd much better stay at home and mind the baby. Still less am I interested in scholarships for female Yids. Edith Wharton mindhomebaby The desire for symmetry, for balance, for rhythm in form as well as in sound, is one of the most inveterate of human instincts. Edith Wharton balancesounddesire
