Human beings are mercifully so constituted as to be able to conceal from themselves what they intend to do until they are well into the doing of it.
Rebecca WestTo every man in the world there is one person of whom he knows little: whom he would never recognize if he met him walking down the street, whose motives are a mystery to him. That is himself.
Rebecca WestThe aged are terrible - mere heaps of cinders on the grass from which none can tell how tall the flames once were or what company gathered round them.
Rebecca WestMarriage had certain commercial advantages. By it the man secures the exclusive right to the woman's body and by it, the woman binds the man to support her during the rest of her life.... A more disgraceful bargain was never struck.
Rebecca Westsentences were used by man before words and still come with the readiness of instinct to his lips. They, and not words, are the foundations of all language. ... Your cat has no words, but it has considerable feeling for the architecture of the sentence in relation to the problem of expressing climax.
Rebecca West