“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

“She is a good and pure woman, and I love her as a man might love an angel.”

— Arnold Bennett《The Grand Babylon Hotel》

“Herein doth consist happiness of life, for a man to know thoroughly the true nature of everything; what is the matter, and what is the form of it: with all his heart and soul, ever to do that which is just, and to speak the truth.”

— Marcus Aurelius《Meditations》

“It was her first duty, the first duty of every man, woman and child in the nation to see that the fighting-men went off in good heart.”

— Alfred Ollivant《One Woman: Being the Second Part of a Romance of Sussex》

“O Truth Who art Eternity! and Love Who art Truth! and Eternity Who art Love!”

— Augustine of Hippo《Confessions》

“If one should dream that such a world began In some slow devil's heart, that hated man, Who should deny him?--God, as thou art clean, Suffer not this, oh, suffer not this sin To be, that e'er I look on such a day!”

— Sophocles《Oedipus King of Thebes: Translated into English Rhyming Verse with Explanatory Notes》

“So fear maddened the Queen, but not in truth the fear of Brangien who was loyal; her own heart bred the fear.”

— Joseph Bédier《The Romance of Tristan & Iseult》

“Alas howe my soule and bodye were lothe to leaue one an another, the sorrowe whereof made me vnwilling to intertaine so cruel an enemy as death: whereupon I plucking vp a good heart, thought thus.”

— Francesco Colonna《Hypnerotomachia Poliphili》

“He knew by his own experience how possible it was to hope against hope, and to hope unconsciously; and he could not bear that her heart should be crushed as his had been by the knowledge of the truth.”

— Mary Elizabeth Braddon《Lady Audley's Secret》

“A great desire to love and be friends, to love everybody, to be friends with everybody, seemed to be invading Lotty—a desire for sheer goodness.”

— Elizabeth von Arnim《The Enchanted April》

“Sometimes love, for a woman, means only shelter; often, for a man, love means the blending of all knowledge, of all beauty, all ambition, of all that he has learned from books and from life.”

— E. Phillips Oppenheim《The Zeppelin's Passenger》

“Robert Bruce, on his death-bed, bequeathed his heart to his friend, the good Lord James, to be borne in war against the Saracens.”

— Walter Scott《The Lady of the Lake》

“There was an end of faith, for he was faithless; there was an end of love, for love had betrayed her; there was an end of beauty, for beauty had been her bane.”

— Benjamin Disraeli《Henrietta Temple》