Edith Wharton

“ Even the face of the pretty girl who had dragged him from his concealment, and who now sat at his side, plying him with sweets from her own plate, began to fade into the general blur; and his last impression was of Cantapresto's figure dilating to immense proportions at the other end of the table, as the soprano rose with shaking wine-glass to favour the company with a song. ”

“ As the seasons change so do our conditions: if the spring is a season of folly, then is the harvest-time the period for reflection. When we last met I was a strolling poet, glad to serve your gifted company within the scope of my talents--now, ladies and gentlemen, now"--he drew himself up with pride--"now you behold in me the governor and friend of the heir-presumptive of Pianura." ”

“ You are too young, doubtless, cavaliere, to have heard of the philosophers who are raising such a pother north of the Alps: a set of madmen that, because their birth doesn't give them the entree of Versailles, are preaching that men should return to a state of nature, great ladies suckle their young like animals, and the peasantry own their land like nobles. Luckily you'll hear little of this infectious talk in Turin: the King stamps out the philosophers like vermin or packs them off to splutter their heresies in Milan or Venice. ”