Isn’t it a most ridiculous thing that married people who both wish to separate can’t do so and be quite free again? - George Gissing

Refuge from despair is often found in the passion of self-pity and that spirit of obstinate resistance which it engenders.

To his mind there was something unnatural in a union between Egremont and Thyrza; try as he would, he could not realise it as having come to pass. The two were parted by so vast a social distinction, and, let Nature say what it will, the artificialities of life are wont to prevail.

. . . the love of a man and a woman who can think intelligently may be the best thing life has to offer them.