Varia

“ Nicanor, his heart pounding hard, his hands clenched, answered nothing, glancing about him to see if the old man might be alone. But the garden lay silent. Then he sprang, as a wolf springs, straight for the old slave's throat, and felled him. Lady Varia screamed,—a quick, shrill sound which stabbed the night stillness like a knife, and cried:
"Oh, kill him not—kill him not! I pray thee, kill him not!"
"Hush thee, dear lady, or the house will be upon us!" Nicanor exclaimed, his words rushing through locked teeth. "Get quickly to thy chamber and leave all things to me." ”

“ Variations in form, size, color, and arrangement of parts have much less to do, and the uses, purposes, and functions of things and of their parts much more to do, with distinctness of character and meaning than we should be likely to think. ”

“ What is working in thee? Or is it the delusion of mine own imaginings? Thy face—thy eyes—have they changed also? Mine own imaginings—vain imaginings! What is there in thy life which could have changed thee? Ah, if but these next months might see thee still more changed!"
Varia rose from her knees beside him.
"Why should I be changed?" she asked. "And why wouldst have me changed? I am happy—I have been happy as I am. If the joy of life is not mine, as thou hast said so often, the sorrow of life is not mine either; and I do not wish to change!" Her voice grew and gathered passion. ”

“ The varieties of character and capacity which subsequently appear in man’s history are the forthcoming of the variations which were induced in the Egos in other and long anterior periods of evolution upon other chains of globes. ”

“ Varia shook her head. She knew not how to parry their curiosity; they, seeing this, were the more curious.
"No," she confessed, low-voiced.
They looked at her and at each other with round eyes of wonder in which laughter lurked.
"Thy husband thy first lover!" Nigidia exclaimed, as one incredulous. "Poor little thing! Girls, is this not sad to hear? But then, poor child, how couldst thou help it, shut away in here where thou canst see never a man at all?"
"Oh, I have seen a man!" Varia cried eagerly. "It is not quite so bad with me as that! A man like unto no other man in the world, I think!" ”

“ His name is a song which thy heart singeth dumbly; when it is spoken it makes thee quiver like a harp on which a certain note is touched. At the very thought of him, of his words, and his caresses, thou dost flush and tremble as though his hands had touched thee. (Girls, see the color burn!) A dear and tender pain is at thy heart; thou livest in dreams, and art possessed by aching unrest which yet is sweet. Is it not even thus with thee?"
"Ay," said Varia, very low. "It is even thus."
"Then thou dost love this man," said Paula. ”

“ Marius exclaimed. "I am not hurting thee!"
"Let the girl go, lord!" said a voice behind them. Marius turned his head, to see a figure bearing down upon them, lean and tall, with a shock of black hair and angry eyes. Varia, turning at the same instant in Marius's grasp, saw the man, and cried:
"Make him to let me go! He hath tried to make me tell thy name—do not thou tell it!"
"So!" Marius exclaimed in triumph, catching the clew. "Thou art the man—thou!" His tone held wrath and amazed disgust.
The slave stood his ground. ”

“ Julia danced on the marble floor, in and out among the slender columns, in jewelled sandals of Varia's, her skirts held high; Nigidia and Valencia, between them, examined a peplus of white silk soft enough to be drawn through the hand, and woven with threads of gold. Gratia, named for her mother, and daughter of Count Pomponius of the Saxon Shore, sat on the couch beside Varia, slowly waving a new fan of peacock's feathers set in a handle of chased gold. Paula and Virginia were turning over an ivory casket of trinkets at a table near by. Varia sat with empty hands, watching and listening. ”

“ She wept softly, with hanging head, making no effort to get away.
"I will pray my lord father that he force me not to become wife to thee!"
"Thy lord father gives command that thou shalt become wife to Marius since he desires thee, and to no other man!" said Eudemius's voice behind them. Marius wheeled, as Varia gave a startled cry and wrenched her hand free. Eudemius came into the room, his face changed as no living soul had seen it changed until then. ”

“ Marius smothered a curse and strode to open it. Mycon stood upon the threshold, and in the lamplight his face showed gray. He stammered like one caught in guilt.
"Lord, thy pardon! There is trouble without, and the master sends to ask my lord's presence. We be encompassed by barbarians who have crept upon us."
"Tell thy lord I come," said Marius. Varia was forgotten; scarcely had the slave vanished down the corridor when Marius was after him, leaving his bride alone. ”

“ Purpureocyanea, viridi-varia, capite fulvo, frontalibus cinereis, palpis antennisque testaceis, pectore testaceo, maculis duabus purpureo-cyaneis, abdomine cano-subtessellato, apice æneo, pedibus validis nigris, tibiis fulvis, alis subcinerascentibus.
Female. Purplish-blue tinged with green, hardly shining. Head fawn-colour, testaceous in front; frontalia cinereous. ”

“ I here assume, what is agreed on by most writers, that beauty of form—so far as it is independent of sensuous pleasure on the one hand, and pleasures of association and suggestion on the other, is resolvable into the presence of a certain order among manifold details, which order is commonly spoken of as unity in variety. With respect, first of all, to the way in which the element of variety and contrast presents itself in visible form, a word or two will suffice. ”

“ It is not easy to communicate the difference by words; it is not merely a difference in clothes. It is a difference in the spirit, a difference in the spirit that causes the expression to be different, whether that expression be clothes, or houses, or cities, or way of life, or music, or literature, or prayer. And while our expression changes, theirs remains the same. Our spirit remains the same, theirs remains the same, but only with us does the expression change. ”

“ I have been trying to show that culture is, or ought to be, the study and pursuit of perfection; and that of perfection as pursued by culture, beauty and intelligence, or, in other words, sweetness and light, are the main characters. But hitherto I have been insisting chiefly on beauty, or sweetness, as a character of perfection. To complete rightly my design, it evidently remains to speak also of intelligence, or light, as a character of perfection. ”

“ And as the word is the root out of which the whole stem of man’s transmitted knowledge, or tradition, has grown up, with all its branches and offshoots, so, too, in the eloquent speech, in the elegant composition, and even in all lofty internal meditation—which form, as it were, the leaves, flowers, and fruits of this goodly tree of living tradition—it is again the word by which the whole is carried on and ultimately perfected. ”

“ By Tradition I mean the entire circle of thought and practice, custom as well as belief, ceremonies, tales, music, songs, dances and other amusements, the philosophy and the superstitions and the institutions, delivered by word of mouth and by example from generation to generation through unremembered ages: in a word, the sum total of the psychological phenomena of uncivilized man. Every people has its own body of Tradition, its own Folklore, which comprises a slowly diminishing part, or the whole, of its mental furniture, according as the art of writing is, or is not, known. ”

“ All the Variety is drawn only from different and uncommon Events; whereas if the Characters are so too, the Diversity and the Pleasure must needs be the more. But as of most general Customs in a Country, there is usually some Ground, from the Nature of the 96 People or Climat, so there may be amongst us for this Vein of our Stage, and a greater Variety of Humour in the Picture, because there is a greater Variety in the Life. ”

“ We shall find at once a uniformity which assures us of the essential identity of the tradition underlying the varying forms, and a diversity indicating that the tradition has undergone a gradual, but radical, modification in the process of literary evolution. ”

“ When any shade of variety is wanting, some place in heaven may be said to be as yet vacant; so that all the differences, or varieties, are to be filled up before the form can exist in full perfection. ”

“ And what would you say of the many beautiful—whether men or horses or garments or any other things which are named by the same names and may be called equal or beautiful,—are they all unchanging and the same always, or quite the reverse? May they not rather be described as almost always changing and hardly ever the same, either with themselves or with one another? ”

“ Each variety of form, color, and character has its appropriate style; but our space here is too limited to allow us to do more than drop a hint toward what each requires, to produce the most harmonious and effective combination. ”

“ Perhaps the principles of unity and variety—two essentials of any art work—enter into the matter. The variety in the uniforms of the different sections satisfies the eye, and the unity of the marching pleases the mind. ”

“ If therefore you find some tales in one collection bearing a close resemblance with those you have read in another, you should make it a matter of interest to observe what is individual in the character of each, and to trace the points both of diversity and analogy in the mode of expression in which they are clothed, and which will be found just as marked as the difference in costume of the respective peoples who have told them each after their own fashion. ”

“ Fuse them together in proper proportions for a few generations, the improvident and dreamy with the thrifty and energetic, the voluble with the reticent, the romantic and humorous with the truthful and blunt of speech, the fiery and impulsive with the sober of thought, and how greatly is the type improved in the new race evolved from the union of both. ”

“ With all the variety that there is in the world of our experience, a variety appealing to our consciousness of difference, there is also great repetition, sameness, or unity. There are many shades of color, as distinguished by the discriminative sensibility of the eye ”

“ It is the crude amorphous material of art, of music and poetry. But on its formal side, whatever its supreme significance as the instrument and medium of expression, speech is a natural convention, an accumulated tradition.
Even tradition, however, is often simply the corporeal embodiment, as it were, of heredity. Behind many a great writer’s personality there stands tradition, and behind tradition the race. ”

“ Variety, the absence of similarity; a word embracing an infinity of differences, from two things that are not absolutely alike, to two things that are absolutely unlike. The judicious use of variety gives interest to ornament, but uniformity with slight variety gives the most dignity. ”

“ Approaching the question as we do, not from the point of view of the evolution of a particular literary form, but from that of a persistent ideal and quasi-philosophical tradition, which manifests itself in all manner of forms and fashions, we have a perfect right to adopt whatever classification suits our purpose best, provided always that we have a clear notion what it is we are discussing. ”

“ I confess, it strikes me as a self-evident truth that variety or contrast is as essential a principle in art and nature as uniformity, and as necessary to make up the harmony of the universe and the contentment of the mind. ”

“ Let the people bring out their talents, and have the variety within them brought forth and made manifest so {650} that we can behold it, like the variety in the works of nature. See the variety God has created—no two trees alike, no two leaves, no two spears of grass alike. ”

“ If we look back at the past times of our own country, what changes do we see! the fashion ever changing, the fashion of government, the fashion of religion, the fashion of dress, the fashion of architecture, all is change, change, and change. ”

“ But while granting that human nature was then what it is now, it is important to comprehend the [6] diversity of the customs, fashions, traditions, conventions, and social needs which evoked an appropriate artistic expression that consequently differs from our own. ”

“ In our opinion, the generalizations happen by the homophonic working of different pictures of the same face which we have come across in the most different conditions and situations, once pale, once reddened, once cheerful, once earnest, once in this light, and once in that. ”

“ For, numerous and diverse as are the objects in nature, they are so constituted and connected—so dependent on and related to one another—as to compose a whole which exhibits a marvellous unity in variety. ”

“ To the three spheres of sentiment, of science, and of practice, conform three classes of character, in whom each respectively predominates. We feel the spirit of the first; we admire the intellect of the second; we deal only with the actions of the third. We turn to the first for inspiration and for influence ”

“ Even the humorous concluding scenes have traits of special grace, retaining in less emphatic passages a stray lire or word of power, as it seems, so that we watch to the end for the traces where the nobler hand has glanced along, leaving its vestiges, as if accidentally or wastefully, in the rising of the style. ”

“ His phraseology rolls ever in solemn and majestic periods, in which every substantive marches ceremoniously accompanied by its epithet; grand pompous words peal like an organ; every proposition is set forth balanced by a proposition of equal length; thought is developed with the compressed regularity and official splendour of a procession. ”