Life altogether is but a crumbling ruin when we turn to look behind
 Jerome K. Jerome, Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow (1886). copy citation

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Author Jerome K. Jerome
Source Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow
Topic life ruin
Date 1886
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/849/849-h/849-h.htm

Context

“but the only thing about it I can call to mind distinctly is that at the most critical moment somebody suddenly opened the door and said, "Emily, you're wanted," in a sepulchral tone that gave one the idea the police had come for her. All the tender words she said to me and all the beautiful things I said to her are utterly forgotten. Life altogether is but a crumbling ruin when we turn to look behind: a shattered column here, where a massive portal stood; the broken shaft of a window to mark my lady's bower; and a moldering heap of blackened stones where the glowing flames once leaped, and over all the tinted lichen and the ivy clinging green.” source