Sympathetic people often don't communicate well, they back reflected images which hide their own depths.

Her future, she thought, was likely to be worse than her past, for after her years of contented renunciation, she had slipped back into desire and longing; she found joyless days of distasteful occupation harder and harder; she found the image of the intense and varied life she yearned for, and despaired of, becoming more and more importunate.

Fine art, poetry, that kind of thing, elevates a nation.

Speech is often barren; but silence also does not necessarily brood over a full nest. Your still fowl, blinking at you without remark, may all the while be sitting on one addled egg; and when it takes to cackling will have nothing to announce but that addled delusion.

... happy husbands and wives can hear each other say the same thing over and over again without being tired.

Wine and the sun will make vinegar without any shouting to help them.

A good solid bit of work lasts.