Cleanliness', chuckled Sir Benjamin, noting his great niece's delighted smile as her eyes rested upon him, 'comes next to godliness, eh, Maria?

autumn days have a holiness that spring lacks ... They are like old serene saints for whom death has lost its terror.

All human beings have their otherness and it is that which cries out to the heart.

Not quite birds, as they were not quite flowers, mysterious and fascinating as are all indeterminate creatures.

He had discovered that the choice between self-love or love of something other than self offers no escape from suffering either way, it is merely a choice between two woundings, of the pride or of the heart.

He grinned at her, and she grinned at him, and it seemed to Maria that suddenly the sun came out.

In a world where thrushes sing and willow trees are golden in the spring, boredom should have been included among the seven deadly sins.