Every secret of a writer's soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written large in his works.

There is something about the present which we would not exchange, though we were offered a choice of all past ages to live in.

Nothing is stronger than the position of the dead among the living.

A light here required a shadow there.

In any case life is but a procession of shadows, and God knows why it is that we embrace them so eagerly, and see them depart with such anguish, being shadows.

writing is the profound pleasure and being read the superficial.

She came into a room; she stood, as he had often seen her, in a doorway with lots of people round her. But it was Clarissa one remembered. Not that she was striking; not beautiful at all; there was nothing picturesque about her; she never said anything specially clever; there she was however; there she was.