... naturalness is not always consonant with taste.

It frightened him to think what must have gone to the making of her eyes.

She would not have put herself out so much to say so little.

...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.

An education is like a crumbling building that needs constant upkeep with repairs and additions.

Overhead hung a summer sky furrowed with the rush of rockets; and from the east a late moon, pushing up beyond the lofty bend of the coast, sent across the bay a shaft of brightness which paled to ashes in the red glitter of the illuminated boats.

I think sometimes that it is almost a pity to enjoy Italy as much as I do, because the acuteness of my sensations makes them rather exhausting; but when I see the stupid Italians I have met here, completely insensitive to their surroundings, and ignorant of the treasures of art and history among which they have grown up, I begin to think it is better to be an American, and bring to it all a mind and eye unblunted by custom.