Is there any wilderness of sand in the deserts of Arabia, is there any prospect of desolation among the ruins of Palestine, which can rival the repelling effect on the eye, and the depressing influence on the mind, of an English country town in the first stage of its existence, and in the transition state of its prosperity?

She looked so irresistibly beautiful as she said those brave words that no man alive could have steel his heart against her.

I am thinking,’ he remarked quietly, ’whether I shall add to the disorder in this room, by scattering your brains about the fireplace.

The dull people decided years and years ago, as everyone knows, that novel-writing was the lowest species of literary exertion, and that novel reading was a dangerous luxury and an utter waste of time.

I am a bundle of nerves dressed up to look like a man!

Except in this ignorant and material century, men have always worn precious stuffs and beautiful colours as well as women.

And earth was heaven a little the worse for wear. And heaven was earth, done up again to look like new.