one who awakens gradually out of a dream, a delicious, grotesque, impossible dream, to feel again the realities pressing into her soul

There are some people who leave impressions not so lasting as the imprint of an oar upon the water.

Perhaps it is better to wake up after all, even to suffer, rather than to remain a dupe to illusions all one's life.

A wedding is one of the most lamentable spectacles on earth.

…there would be no powerful will binding hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow creature…And yet she had loved him- sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter! What could love, the unsolved mystery, count for in the face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being.

There was no despondency when she fell asleep that night; nor was there hope when she awoke in the morning.

Do you suppose a woman knows why she loves? Does she select? Does she say to herself, 'Go to! here is a distinguished statesman with presidential possibilities; I shall proceed to fall in love with him.' or, 'I shall set my heart upon this musician, whose fame is on every tongue?' or 'this financier, who controls the world's money markets?'