One of the joys our technological civilisation has lost is the excitement with which seasonal flowers and fruits were welcomed; th...e first daffodil, strawberry or cherry are now things of the past, along with their precious moment of arrival. Even the tangerine--now a satsuma or clementine--appears de-pipped months before Christmas.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In France, and at the most important period of our history, Catherine de' Medici has suffered more from popular error than any oth...er woman, unless it be Brunehaut or Frédégonde; while Marie de' Medici, whose every action was prejudicial to France, has escaped the disgrace that should cover her name.... Catherine de' Medici ... saved the throne of France, she maintained [the] Royal authority under circumstances to which more than one great prince would have succumbed. Face to face with such leaders of the factions and ambitions of the houses of Guise and of Bourbon as the two Cardinals de Lorraine and the two "Balafrès," the two Princes de Condé, Queen Jeanne d'Albret, Henri IV, the Connétable de Montmorency, Calvin, the Colignys and Théodore de Bèze, she was forced to put forth the rarest fine qualities, the most essential gifts of statesmanship, under the fire of the Calvinist press.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Love or hatred must constantly increase between two persons who are always together; every moment fresh reasons are found for lovi...ng or hating better.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is only in the act of nursing that a woman realizes her motherhood in visible and tangible fashion; it is a joy of every moment....LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
At this moment, who would not remain persuaded that these women were virtuous? Are they not the flower of the country? Are they al...l not fresh, ravishing, intoxicating with beauty, youth, life and love? To believe in their virtue is a kind of social religion; because they are the world's ornament and the glory of France.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
'Tis said of love that it sometimes goes, sometimes flies; runs with one, walks gravely with another; turns a third into ice, and ...sets a fourth in a flame: it wounds one, another it kills: like lightning it begins and ends in the same moment: it makes that fort yield at night which it besieged but in the morning; for there is no force able to resist it.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
There is a social respect necessary in company: you may start your own subject of conversation with modesty, taking care, however,... de ne jamais parler de cordes dans la maison d'un pendu.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Tea! Thou soft, thou sober, sage, and venerable liquid, thou innocent pretence for bringing the wicked of both sexes together in a... morning; thou female tongue-running, smile-smoothing, heart- opening, wink-tipping cordial, to whose glorious insipidity I owe the happiest moment of my life, let me fall prostrate thus, and ... adore thee.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »