"There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it."
"And he felt himself oppressed by this creation of factitious purity, so cunningly manufactured by a conspiracy of mothers and aunts and grandmothers and long-dead ancestresses, because it was supposed to be what he wanted, what he had a right to, in order that he might exercise his lordly pleasure in smashing it like an image made of snow."
6 likes
Source: Edith Wharton (2013). “Delphi Works of Edith Wharton (Illustrated)”, p.1906, Delphi Classics
About the author
Same author
More quotes by Edith Wharton
"The desire for symmetry, for balance, for rhythm in form as well as in sound, is one of the most inveterate of human instincts."
"I despair of the Republic! Such dreariness, such whining sallow women, such utter absence of the amenities, such crass food, crass manners, crass landscape!! What a horror it is for a whole nation to be developing without the sense of beauty, and eating bananas for breakfast."
"To visit Morocco is still like turning the pages of some illuminated Persian manuscript all embroidered with bright shapes and subtle lines."
"One can remain alive ... if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity interested in big things and happy in small ways."
"If only we'd stop trying to be happy, we could have a pretty good time."