John Oliver Hobbes

“ Wiche was uncertain how to reply, when she herself, brushing the tears from her cheeks, asked him a question.
"Why?" she said, "why are you not going to marry Lady Mallinger?"
"I want to tell you about that," he said. "I am afraid there is not time to tell the whole story now. But Lady Mallinger discovered that she had made a mistake, she loved some one else, and I—I have been such a fool, Teresa, such a fool! I do not know whether I love you or not. I only know that I hate my life when you are not near me!" ”

“ I am only proud to know that I am capable of loving any one. All affection seems to have been laughed out of the world: when it is not ridiculous, it is thought hysterical. To me it remains and always must remain, the greatest—the only perfect gift—that God has given us. So I have told you." Her lips trembled a little as she added, "I suppose, too, you have heard it already from Lady Mallinger?"
"What could I hear from Lady Mallinger," he asked, growing more and more bewildered. Teresa's expression was so frigid though her words were so kind. ”

“ But to him who loves others—even one other" —he found himself looking into Teresa's eyes—"even one other—the commonest things seem rare, the blackest shadows have a radiance indescribable, and the harshest notes are heavenly melodies: disappointment, bitterness, and desolation have no part in his existence!"
"These exalted moods are brief—terribly brief," said Teresa, "and they show us just enough of our lost divinity [7] to make us ever more wretched as mere mortals and children of Adam [8] . ”