And where the deepest current crawls/ Like thistledown the dainty fly falls./ Then from the depths a silver gleam/ Quick flashes, like a jewel bright./ Up through the waters of the stream/ An instant visible to sight/ As lightning cleaves to sombre sky/ A rainbow rises to the fly.

Most true points are fine points. There never was a dispute between mortals where both sides hadn't a bit of right.

The sea has formed the English character and the essential England is to be found in those who follow it. From blue waters they have learned mercifulness, and they have also learned - in the grimmest of schools - precision and resolution. The sea endures no makeshifts. If a thing is not exactly right it will be vastly wrong.

I wondered whether the scientific modern brain could not get to the stage of realising that Space is not an empty homogeneous medium, but full of intricate differences, intelligible and real, though not with our common reality.

That is the supreme value of history. The study of it is the best guarantee against repeating it.

Leadership is only courage and wisdom, and a great carefulness of self.

"What would you call the highest happiness, Lewie?" he asked. "The sense of competence," was the answer, given without hesitation.