The Irish are a philosophic as well as a practical race. Their first and strongest impulse is to make the best of a bad situation—to put a better fac… - Theodore Dreiser

The growth of a passion is a very peculiar thing. In highly
organized intellectual and artistic types it is so often apt to
begin with keen appreciation of certain qualities, modified by
many, many mental reservations. The egoist, the intellectual,
gives but little of himself and asks much. Nevertheless, the
lover of life, male or female, finding himself or herself in
sympathetic accord with such a nature, is apt to gain much.

There is nothing in this world more delightful than that middle state in which we mentally balance at times, possessed of the means, lured by desire, and yet deterred by conscience or want of decision.

One of his self–imposed tasks was to go about the house after Lester, or the servants, turning out the gas–jets or electric–light bulbs which might accidentally have been left burning. That was a sinful extravagance.