If there is one thing I have learned, from loving Jessamine and even from the evil tasks you have made me do, it is that all forms of life are worthy of compassion.
They disrupted the performance.
Lady Constance swept into the room as giddy and foolish as ever. To look at her, you would think that nothing unpleasant had ever happened in the whole history of England.
All books are judged by their covers until they are read.
Plants make the air! Do you understand what that means? Our food, our air, our very lives come from the plants. How could they not be of divine origin, of divine intelligence? How can we deny that, in some essential way, they are no less than you or I?
If it were easy to resist, it would not be called chocolate cake.
Nothing good was ever learned from eavesdropping, so mind your business and let others mind theirs.
In the words of Agatha Swanburne, founder of Swanburne Academy, ‘Every book is judged by its cover until it is read.’
Call it professional interest. You see, Jessamine, love is a kind of poison; one of my favorite kinds, in fact. It infects the blood; it takes over the mind; it seizes dominion over the body. It amuses me to think of him pining for you. Aching for what he cannot have. The loneliness in his soul is festering like a wound. There is nothing I could do for him that is worse that what you have already done, my lovely. And I assure you, in his case there will be no cure.
You flesh bodies are so obsessed with goodness, yet no other form of life on earth is capable of such cruelty. You need only convince yourselves your transgressions serve some ‘purpose.’ Even if it is only greed, or lust, or the raw desire for power that drives you. You will spill the blood of your kinsmen, lay waste to the earth itself, wreak havoc, and cause unspeakable suffering – any and all sins are justified, as long as they are a means to your precous, righteous ‘purpose’.
That is the purpose of museums, of course. One does not go merely to collect facts and souvenirs and picture post cards, but to enlarge one’s notion of all that has been, and all that is, and all that might be. In this way we begin to understand what part each of us was born to play in the marvelous tale of existence.
Complaining doesn’t butter the biscuit” -Agatha Swanburne.
That which can be purchases at a shop is easily left in a taxi; that which you carry inside you is difficult, though not impossible, to misplace” -Agatha Swanburne.
To do something familiar and succeed is no surprise, but to try something new and fail – why, that is the start of an adventure.
I supposed this is what is meant by ‘growing up’... Find out the difference between what one expected one’s life would be like and how things really are” -Lady Constance.
This practice of overstating the case is called hyperbole. Hyperbole is usually harmless, but in some cases it has been known to precipitate unnecessary wars as well as a painful gaseous condition called stock market bubbles.
She had chosen Dante because she found the rhyme scheme pleasingly jaunty, but she realized too late that the Inferno’s tale of sinners being cruelly punished in the afterlife was much too bloody and disturbing to be suitable for young minds. Penelope could tell this by the way the children hung on her every word and demanded “More, more!” each time she reached the end of a canto and tried to stop.
This practice of overstating the case is called hyperbole. Hyperbole is usually harmless, but in some cases it has been known to precipitate unnecessary wars as well as a painful gaseous condition called stock market bubbles. For safety’s sake, then, hyperbole should be used with restraint and only by those with proper literary training.
Busy hands and idle minds have knitted many a sweater; Busy minds and idle hands have knitted many a brow.
To be kept waiting is unfortunate, but to be kept waiting with nothing interesting to read is a tragedy of Greek proportions” -Agatha Swanburne.