24
" We are, not metaphorically but in very truth, a Divine work of art, something that God is making, and therefore something with which He will not be satisfied until it has a certain character. Here again we come up against what I have called the “intolerable compliment.” Over a sketch made idly to amuse a child, an artist may not take much trouble: he may be content to let it go even though it is not exactly as he meant it to be. But over the great picture of his life—the work which he loves, though in a different fashion, as intensely as a man loves a woman or a mother a child—he will take endless trouble—and would doubtless, thereby give endless trouble to the picture if it were sentient. One can imagine a sentient picture, after being rubbed and scraped and re-commenced for the tenth time, wishing that it were only a thumb-nail sketch whose making was over in a minute. In the same way, it is natural for us to wish that God had designed for us a less glorious and less arduous destiny; but then we are wishing not for more love but for less. "
― C.S. Lewis , The Problem of Pain
26
" Westcliff sees an odd sort of logic in why you would finally be the one to win St. Vincent’s heart. He says a girl like you would appeal to…hmm, how did he put it?…I can’t remember the exact words, but it was something like…you would appeal to St. Vincent’s deepest, most secret fantasy.”
Evie felt her cheeks flushing while a skirmish of pain and hope took place in the tired confines of her chest. She tried to respond sardonically. “I should think his fantasy is to consort with as many women as possible.”
A grin crossed Lillian’s lips. “Dear, that is not St. Vincent’s fantasy, it’s his reality. And you’re probably the first sweet, decent girl he’s ever had anything to do with.”
“He spent quite a lot of time with you and Daisy in Hampshire,” Evie countered.
That seemed to amuse Lillian further. “I’m not at all sweet, dear. And neither is my sister. Don’t say you have been laboring under that misconception all this time? "
― Lisa Kleypas , Devil in Winter (Wallflowers, #3)
27
" Just imagine the existence of a man - let us call him A - who has left youth far behind, and of a woman whom we may call B, who is young and happy and has seen nothing as yet of life or of the world. Family circumstances of various kinds brought them together, and he grew to love her as a daughter, and had no fear that his love would change its nature. But he forgot that B was so young, that life was still a May-game to her and that it was easy to fall in love with her in a different way, and that this would amuse her. He made a mistake and was suddenly aware of another feeling, as heavy as remorse, making its way into his heart, and he was afraid. He was afraid that their old friendly relations would be destroyed, and he made up his mind to go away before that happened. "
― Leo Tolstoy , Family Happiness
30
" Even more remote from his way of thinking, even more impossible than any other thought, would have been words such as this: “Is it only I alone who have created this experience, or is it objective reality? Does the Master have the same feelings as I, or would mine amuse him? Are my thoughts new, unique, my own, or have the Master and many before him experienced and thought exactly the same?” No, for him there were no such analyses and differentiations. Everything was reality, was steeped in reality, full of it as bread dough is of yeast. "
― Hermann Hesse , The Glass Bead Game
34
" Carpe Diem
By Edna Stewart
Shakespeare, Robert Frost, Walt Whitman did it, why can't I?
The words of Horace, his laconic phrase. Does it amuse me or frighten me?
Does it rub salt in an old wound? Horace, Shakespeare, Robert Frost and Walt Whitman my loves,
we've all had a taste of the devils carpe of forbidden food.
My belly is full of mourning over life mishaps of should have's, missed pleasure, and why was I ever born?
The leaf falls from the trees from which it was born in and cascade down like a feather that tumbles and toil in the wind.
One gush! It blows away. It’s trampled, raked, burned and finally turns to ashes which fades away like the leaves of grass.
Did Horace get it right? Trust in nothing?
The shortness of Life is seventy years, Robert Frost and Whitman bared more, but Shakespeare did not.
Butterflies of Curiosities allures me more.
Man is mortal, the fruit is ripe. Seize more my darling!
Enjoy the day. "
― Edna Stewart , The Call of the Christmas Pecan Tree
35
" There are even some stars so remote that their light will reach the Earth only when Earth itself is a dead planet, as they themselves are dead, so that the living Earth will never be visited by that forlorn ray of light, without a living source, without a living destination. Often on fine nights when the park of this establishment is vacant, I amuse myself with this marvelous instrument (telescope). I go upstairs, walk across the grass, sit on a bench in the Avenue of Oaks – and there, in my solitude, I enjoy the pleasure of weighing the rays of dead stars. "
― Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam , Tomorrow's Eve
