There is only one success: To be able to spend your life in your own way. - Christopher Morley

For paradise in the world to come is uncertain, but there is indeed a heaven on this earth, a heaven we inhabit when we read a good book.

"He pushed through the bushes. In a little hollow were three small puppies, whining faintly. They were cold and draggled with mud. Someone had left them there, evidently, to perish. They were huddled close together; their eyes, a cloudy unspeculative blue, were only just opened. "This is gruesome," said Gissing, pretending to be shocked."

is intolerable for a human being to go on doing any task as a penance, under duress. No matter what the work is, one must spiritualize it in some way, shatter the old idea of it into bits and rebuild it nearer to the heart’s desire.