A piece of writing is like a piece of magic. You create something out of nothing.

He understood for the first time that the world is not dumb at all, but merely waiting for someone to speak to it in a language it understands.

It was an old fashioned house --the sort of house in fact, as Strange expressed it, which a lady in a novel might like to be persecuted in.

I mean that two of any thing is a most uncomfortable number. One may do as he pleases. Six may get along well enough. But two must always struggle for mastery. Two must always watch each other. The eyes of all the world will be on two, uncertain which of them to follow.

..The argument he was conducting with his neighbor as to whether the English magician had gone mad because he was a magician, or because he was English.

There was very little about her face and figure that was in any way remarkable, but it was the sort of face which, when animated by conversation or laughter, is completely transformed. She had a lovely disposition, a quick mind and a fondness for the comical. She was always very ready to smile and, since a smile is the most becoming ornament that any lady can wear, she had been known upon occasion to outshine women who were acknowledged beauties in three countries.

He gave her his heart. She took it and placed it quietly in the pocket of her gown. No one observed what she did.