Comparatively few people know what a million dollars actually is. To the majority it is a gaseous concept, swelling or decreasing as the occasion suggests. In the minds of politicians, perhaps more than anywhere, the notion of a million dollars has this accordion-like ability to expand or contract; if they are disposing of it, the million is a pleasing sum, reflecting warmly upon themselves; if somebody else wants it, it becomes a figure of inordinate size, not to be compassed by the rational mind.
Robertson DaviesWhen one is traveling, one must expect to spend a certain amount of money foolishly.
Robertson DaviesTristan and Isolde were lucky to die when they did. They'd have been sick of all that rubbish in a year.
Robertson DaviesTo be apt in quotation is a splendid and dangerous gift. Splendid, because it ornaments a man's speech with other men's jewels; dangerous, for the same reason.
Robertson Davies