A great deal of unnecessary worry is indulged in by theatregoers trying to understand what Bernard Shaw means. They are not satisf...ied to listen to a pleasantly written scene in which three or four clever people say clever things, but they need to purse their lips and scowl a little and debate as to whether Shaw meant the lines to be an attack on monogamy as an institution or a plea for manual training in the public school system.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I recommend limiting one's involvement in other people's lives to a pleasantly scant minimum. This may seem too stoical a position... in these madly passionate times, but madly passionate people rarely make good on their madly passionate promises.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The hero is a mind of such balance that no disturbances can shake his will, but pleasantly, and, as it were, merrily, he advances ...to his own music, alike in frightful alarms and in the tipsy mirth of universal dissoluteness.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I have been required to put roots and shoots and little stems and tendrils together much as their author did, to wander discourage...d and confused as Hansel and Gretel through a dark wood of witches, to strike the hot right way suddenly, but just as suddenly to mire, to drag, to speed, to shout Urreek! to fall asleep, to submit to revelations, certainly to curl a lip, to doubt, unnose a disdainful snort, snick a superior snicker, curse, and then at some point not very pleasantly to realize that the game I'm playing is the game of creation itself, because Tender Buttons is above all a book of kits like those from which harpsichords or paper planes or model bottle boats are fashioned, with intricacy no objection, patience a demand, unreadable plans a pleasure.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
When all who had money and leisure Grew rural o'er ices and wines,... All pleasantly toiling for pleasure, All hungrily pining for pines, And making of beautiful speeches, And marring of beautiful shows, And feeding on delicate peaches, And treading on delicate toes.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
One of the peculiarities of recent speculation, especially in America, is that ideas are abandoned in virtue of a mere change of f...eeling, without any new evidence or new arguments. We do not nowadays refute our predecessors, we pleasantly bid them good-bye.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is always singular, but encouraging, to meet with common sense in very old books, as the Heetopades of Veeshnoo Sarma; a playfu...l wisdom which has eyes behind as well as before, and oversees itself. It asserts their health and independence of the experience of later times. This pledge of sanity cannot be spared in a book, that it sometimes pleasantly reflect upon itself.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Soon after John's death I listened to a music-box, and if, at any time, that event had seemed inconsistent with the beauty and har...mony of the universe, it was then gently constrained into the placid course of nature by those steady notes, in mild and unoffended tone echoing far and wide under the heavens. But I find these things more strange than sad to me. What right have I to grieve, who have not ceased to wonder? We feel at first as if some opportunities of kindness and sympathy were lost, but learn afterward that any pure grief is ample recompense for all. That is, if we are faithful; for a great grief is but sympathy with the soul that disposes events, and is as natural as the resin on Arabian trees. Only Nature has a right to grieve perpetually, for she only is innocent. Soon the ice will melt, and the blackbirds sing along the river which he frequented, as pleasantly as ever. The same everlasting serenity will appear in this face of God, and we will not be sorrowful if he is not.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We feel at first as if some opportunities of kindness and sympathy were lost, but learn afterward that any pure grief is ample rec...ompense for all. That is, if we are faithful;Mfor a spent grief is but sympathy with the soul that disposes events, and is as natural as the resin of Arabian trees.--Only nature has a right to grieve perpetually, for she only is innocent. Soon the ice will melt, and the blackbirds sing along the river which he frequented, as pleasantly as ever. The same everlasting serenity will appear in this face of God, and we will not be sorrowful, if he is not.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »