Second person

“ Now and again we have met the same, we have fancied, in the person of a younger sister, or a daughter, or perhaps of no kindred except that of sentiments and disposition, which always give a similar expression to the countenance. Sometimes, too, we have met the self-same being, changed, alas! ”

“ Second love is founded upon judgment, and is strengthened and matured by it—yes—I am a philosopher—d—me! But if such is the case with a second or third love, what must be the strength and maturity, the fervour and ferocity of a twentieth love, like mine, for thee? ”

“ After all, the essence of love, the finest spirit of that companionship you speak about, of the sisterhood of soul, is that the other person should quicken you, too; open to you new horizons, discover new possibilities ”

“ Rarely, indeed, we imagine has one person, even though a father, or a husband, ever enveloped the life of another with such an atmosphere of pure, caressing, intimate sympathy and affection as surrounds these letters. ”

“ Of course, I know perfectly well that neither of you want me, when you haven’t seen each other for so long and must have heaps and heaps to say to one another, but I thought I would risk the odium of being the third person on an occasion when two are company and three are a nuisance. ”

“ 'I had no first love,' he said at last; 'I began with the second.'
'How was that?'
'It's very simple. ”

“ Our couple had at all events effected an exchange; the elder friend had been as consciously intellectual as possible, and the younger, abounding in personal revelation, had been as unconsciously distinguished. ”

“ No matter; their hearts are in the right place, whatever they look like. They used to be remarkably like each other in person, and there is scarcely a year between them in age, but there was a difference in their manners, certainly. ”

“ Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there 's a pair of us — don't tell! ”

“ Their intercourse, which was wholly by letter, for they never met, passes through the stages of civility, admiration, esteem, regard and culminates in a tone of the tenderest affection and mutual confidence. ”

“ Remark an engaged couple; sooner than be silent they will whisper if there be company present; and when alone, or when they think themselves alone, their tongues—particularly the girl's—are never still. Grace and I were of a talking age—two-and-twenty, and one not yet eighteen; our minds had no knowledge of life, no experience, nothing in them to keep them steady ”

“ Two young men were travelling this road, bound by that early friendship which is one of the strongest of human ties; the one going down to marry the sister of his friend,—the other to witness his happiness. ”

“ Or she can use the be-where-men-are approach by attending parties, meetings and community affairs which by their very nature bring her into contact with men.
After winning the person’s attention—whether you are a man or a girl—the best way to arouse his or her interest is through conversation—and not just any conversation. Here out of the whole universe is one person before you. What kind of person is he or she? ”

“ Once we have sufficient indication that another person cares for the same kind of things that we do—or, as important quite, cares in the same degree or in the same way—all further explanation becomes superfluous: detail, delightful occasionally to quicken and bring home the sense of companionship, but by no means needed. ”

“ Now, it will be readily seen, that if a plausible man or woman have an easy means of pleasing the world by an adaptation of self to all its twistings and twinings, a plausible man and woman, or, in other words, a plausible couple, playing into each other’s hands, and acting in concert, have a manifest advantage. ”

“ You are engaged, and there now arises in your mind the query as to the conduct of yourselves during this period of engagement: How much of privilege shall you grant your lover? As you are promised to each other for life, are you not warranted in assuming towards each other greater personal familiarity? May you not with perfect modesty allow endearments and caresses that hitherto have not been permissible? ”

“ Even in this age of more fastidious manners, it is probable that the tender interchanges of affection between a young couple rejoining each other after deep calamities, and standing on the brink of fresh, perhaps endless separations, would meet with something of the same indulgence from the least interested witnesses. ”

“ A mutual confidence and a mutual dependence upon each other gradually took the place of early reserves, and now they sweetly draw together—now they smoothly glide along the stream of life blessed indeed in all their marriage relations. ”

“ After a while, the young couple, though loving each other none the less, began to respond to the many calls which invited them again into society, and the pride they felt in each other added zest to the pleasures of their return. ”

“ She gets to know her husband’s every word, every mood, every gesture by heart. To call his presence companionship, or the boon that comes with friendship, would be to cast a slur on all companionship and friendship for ever. ”

“ The two worlds—the spiritual and the material—are like twin sisters whom I have seen, so similar that their acquaintances could not distinguish between them, and yet so dissimilar that an intimate friend would wonder why one should ever be mistaken for the other. ”

“ The first meeting between two persons who, though nearly related, are yet virtually strangers, ignorant of each other's thoughts, feelings, and tastes, even of each other's past life — whose intercourse has consisted in the exchange of brief and formal letters, and who have had, so far, nothing in common but the interest and the affection born of a sense of duty — must needs be attended with more or less of restraint and embarrassment ”

“ Now, this serious pair, who had but lately formed an attachment, were quite peculiarly distinguished among the others, who, being already better acquainted with each other, of more frivolous character, and careless as to the future, roved about with levity in these connections, which commonly pass away as the mere fruitless prelude to subsequent and more serious ties, and very seldom produce a lasting effect upon life. ”

“ He had braced himself to face the consequences of his own letter to the woman he loved, and he was face to face with the consequences of another man's letter to the same woman, to the woman who had two lovers. ”

“ What an intimacy, what an intensity of relation, I said to myself, so successful a process implied! It was of course familiar enough that when people were so deeply in love they rubbed off on each other—that a great pressure of soul to soul usually left on either side a sufficient show of tell-tale traces. ”

“ Meeting them thus, enjoying witticisms and good cheer in one another’s excellent company, we feel a closer bond between their life and our own than if they were always presented to us in public ceremonial or with pen and folio in hand. ”

“ For although thou wilt depart hence without learning my name, or who I may be, or the place to which you have been brought to meet me,—though we shall behold each other no more until thou hast rendered thyself worthy of my hand, yet shall I ever be mindful of thee, my loved one! ”

“ As our mutual affection increased, my companion, whom I had informed of the outlines of my past life, and who was aware of the dangers to which I was daily exposed, being filled with tender fears of losing me for ever, and prompted by sincere affection, suggested the idea of uniting ourselves indissolubly by marriage ”

“ It is of great importance to distinguish, whether a gentleman who has the appearance of being your lover, delays to speak explicitly, from the motive I have mentioned, or from a diffidence inseparable from true attachment. ”

“ Just now the gentleman is asleep and his spouse, not for the first time, indulging in an agitated flirtation with one of her own remote descendants who has not yet found a home for himself: a very bad example to the rest of us.... ”

“ As the days went by, Bill and I came to know each other better and better—not stridently and vociferously, but more or less silently as primitive men have learned each other, working together since the world began. ”

“ Everything with the formal couple resolves itself into a matter of form. They don't call upon you on your account, but their own; not to see how you are, but to show how they are: it is not a ceremony to do honour to you, but to themselves,--not due to your position, but to theirs. ”

“ Johnson pronounced a second marriage to be "The triumph of Hope over Experience." Others who are less epigrammatic affirm that to take a second partner is the highest compliment that can be paid to the departed first. ”

“ The lady, however, recovering herself after a little space, said to her husband, with a sigh, 'My dear, misfortunes never come single.' My friend, I found, acted but an under part at his table; and, being a man of more good-nature than understanding, thinks himself obliged to fall in with all the passions and humours of his yoke-fellow. ”

“ The young man, her lover in her youth, the old servant who in those days was perpetually about her—the two who had so often met in familiar if not friendly relations, now to face each other as judge and accused! ”

“ Father says to me, ‘Please, daughter, no high school engagement.’ I suppose I agree with him that his ideas are always sensible. Probably I am too young to know how to choose a ‘life partner.’ Still, he and Mother weren’t awfully old. ”

“ We establish with such objects a relationship, I had almost said a friendship; they become, as it were, a part of ourselves, things essential to our own existence; and that deep attachment we feel to the place of our birth, or our home, finds its apology not alone in natural instinct, or in acquired habits, but also in the highest philosophical considerations. ”

“ The formal couple, in fact, joyfully seize all occasions of testifying their good-breeding and precise observance of the little usages of society; and for you, who are the means to this end, they care as much as a man does for the tailor who has enabled him to cut a figure, or a woman for the milliner who has assisted her to a conquest. ”

“ Some of the people who watched them standing side by side thought they must be newly wedded because of their happy faces, and others that they were an old-established couple because of their easy confidence in each other. ”

“ No sooner have they paired, than the happy couple begin to show the tenderest affection towards each other, manifested by innumerable graceful caresses; they swim together with indefatigable constancy, and should danger approach defend each other with the utmost courage and self-devotion. ”

“ As we sat communicating to each other in the full confidence of our hearts (for the miserable are ever greatly relieved by talking of themselves) , I discovered that never before had I acquired an insight into the real character of my associate. ”

“ Thus, in the country, when wandering with a young and pretty companion, she will become all the more interesting, because we see her face and hear her voice alone, without being contrasted with the faces, voices, or manners of others ”

“ Mother said that the year's engagement was so that you and Captain Forrester should learn to be quite sure of yourselves. Now, how are you to be any surer of yourselves than you are now if you don't get to know one another any better? And how are you going to know one another any better if you never see one another, and never write to one another? ”

“ Our young married couples may feel that two is company and three is none, but there comes a little noisy intruder to break into their sweet intimacy. The coming of the third is the beginning of a new life for them as well as for it—a life which is more useful and more permanent, but never so concentrated as before. ”

“ Between living on as the dependent of a somewhat exacting relative and becoming the full partner of this young stranger, who with men had proved himself so masterful, and who with her was so gentle, there seemed but little choice. ”

“ But friendship requires a steady constant and unchangeable character, a person that is uniform in his intimacy. ”

“ They are a young couple, walking together; the gentleman appearing to admire the lady, I will confess; and we are a young couple walking together, the gentleman appearing to admire the lady, or he does no credit to his taste or sensibility. ”