Theodore Dreiser

“ The mystic, shadowy water, faintly rippling in a light wind, the mystic, shadowy pines conferring in the light breezes, the cries of night birds and owls—too disturbing to Clyde to be listened to with anything but inward distress. The wonder and glory of all this—if only—if only he were not stalked after, as by a skeleton, by the horror not only of what he had done in connection with Roberta but the danger and the power of the law that deemed him a murderer! And then Sondra, the others having gone to bed—or off into the shadow,—stealing out for a few last words and kisses under the stars. ”

“ So, too, this other flower of womanhood.
Jennie was left alone, but, like the wood-dove, she was a voice of sweetness in the summer-time. Going about her household duties, she was content to wait, without a murmur, the fulfilment of that process for which, after all, she was but the sacrificial implement. When her duties were lightest she was content to sit in quiet meditation, the marvel of life holding her as in a trance. When she was hardest pressed to aid her mother, she would sometimes find herself quietly singing, the pleasure of work lifting her out of herself. ”

“ It was a city that put vitality into almost every wavering heart: it made the beginner dream dreams; the aged to feel that misfortune was never so grim that it might not change.
Underneath, of course, was struggle. Youth and hope and energy were setting a terrific pace. You had to work here, to move, to step lively. You had to have ideas. This city demanded of you your very best, or it would have little to do with you. Youth in its search for something—and age—were quickly to feel this. It was no fool's paradise.
Eugene, once he was settled, realized this. ”

“ Deep below deep lie the mysteries, and theories flourish like weeds in a garden—or let us call them flowers, for at times they are so artistic. Arts spring out of the mysteries, but the arts themselves grow stale if left to themselves. The thing that the individual should remember is that he is a part of this vast restlessness, uncertainty and opportunism. Life will have none of anything forever, neither Egypt nor Greece nor Rome nor England nor America; it will not have anything of one type of god, nor a fixed code of morals, nor a fixed conclusion as to what is art, nor a method of living. ”

“ It had been days since Hurstwood had done more than go to the grocery or to the news-stand. Now the weariness of indoors was upon him—had been for two days—but chill, grey weather had held him back. Friday broke fair and warm. It was one of those lovely harbingers of spring, given as a sign in dreary winter that earth is not forsaken of warmth and beauty. The blue heaven, holding its one golden orb, poured down a crystal wash of warm light. It was plain, from the voice of the sparrows, that all was halcyon outside. Carrie raised the front windows, and felt the south wind blowing. ”

“ Aileen was fairly bursting with hope and vanity and longing. Oh, to be Mrs. Frank Algernon Cowperwood here in Chicago, to have a splendid mansion, to have her cards of invitation practically commands which might not be ignored!
“Oh, dear!” she sighed to herself, mentally. “If only it were all true—now.”
It is thus that life at its topmost toss irks and pains. Beyond is ever the unattainable, the lure of the infinite with its infinite ache. ”

“ England, France, Italy, Germany, London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Canterbury, Amiens, St. Peter’s, Pisa—I could not look on those any more with fresh and wondering eyes. How brief life is, I thought! How taciturn in its mood! It gives us a brief sip, some of us, once and then takes the cup away. It seemed to me, as I sat here looking out on the fresh and sweet canals of Holland, that I could idle thus forever jotting down foolish impressions, exclaiming over fleeting phases of beauty, wiping my eyes at the hails and farewells that are so precious and so sad. ”

“ Clyde, those are all words addressed to you. They come to me here to say to you just as though they were being whispered to me. I am but the mouthpiece for these words spoken direct to you. Take counsel with your own heart. Turn from the shadow to the light. Let us break these bonds of misery and gloom; chase these shadows and this darkness. You have sinned. The Lord can and will forgive. Repent. Join with him who has shaped the world and keeps it. He will not spurn your faith; he will not neglect your prayers. Turn—in yourself—in the confines of this cell—and say: 'Lord, help me. ”

“ In the crowded elevator, another dusty, toil-stained youth tried to make an impression on her by leering in her face.
One young man, waiting on the walk outside for the appearance of another, grinned at her as she passed.
"Ain't going my way, are you?" he called jocosely.
Carrie turned her face to the west with a subdued heart. As she turned the corner, she saw through the great shiny window the small desk at which she had applied. There were the crowds, hurrying with the same buzz and energy-yielding enthusiasm. ”

“ Angela, who was wide-eyed, flushed, exhausted, lying staring on her pillow, asked in a weary, indifferent voice: "What do you want me to do, Eugene, leave you?"
"I'll tell you, Angela," he said sepulchrally, "I don't know what I want you to do just at this moment. The old life is all over. It's as dead as dead can be. For eleven or twelve years now I have lived with you, knowing all the while that I was living a lie. I have never really loved you since we were married. You know that. I may have loved you in the beginning, yes, I did, and at Blackwood, but that was a long, long while ago. ”

“ Jennie had not sought to hold herself dear. Innate feeling in her made for self-sacrifice. She could not be readily corrupted by the world’s selfish lessons on how to preserve oneself from the evil to come.
It is in such supreme moments that growth is greatest. It comes as with a vast surge, this feeling of strength and sufficiency. We may still tremble, the fear of doing wretchedly may linger, but we grow. Flashes of inspiration come to guide the soul. In nature there is no outside. When we are cast from a group or a condition we have still the companionship of all that is. ”

“ He could not control his own temperament any more than Aileen could control hers.
The worst of this situation was that it was now becoming complicated on Cowperwood’s part with the most disturbing thoughts concerning Berenice Fleming. Ever since the days when he had first met her mother he had been coming more and more to feel for the young girl a soul-stirring passion—and that without a single look exchanged or a single word spoken. There is a static something which is beauty, and this may be clothed in the habiliments of a ragged philosopher or in the silks and satins of pampered coquetry. ”

“ One always feels in New York, for some reason, as though he might be put out, or even thrown out. There is such a perpetual and heavy invasion of the stranger. Here in London I could not help feeling off-hand as though things were rather stable and that I was welcome in the world’s great empire city on almost any basis on which I wished myself taken. That sense of civility and courtesy to which I have already so often referred was everywhere noticeable in mail-men, policemen, clerks, servants. Alas, when I think of New York, how its rudeness, in contrast, shocks me! At home I do not mind. ”