To be 70 years old is like climbing the Alps. You reach a snow-crowned summit, and see behind you the deep valley stretching miles and miles away, and before you other summits higher and whiter, which you may have strength to climb, or may not. Then you sit down and meditate and wonder which it will be. There is nothing holier in this life of ours than the first consciousness of love, the first fluttering of its silken wings. The rays of happiness, like those of light, are colorless when unbroken. The holiest of holidays are those kept by ourselves in silence and apart; the secret anniversaries of the heart. The holiest of all holidays are those kept by ourselves in silence and apart; the secret anniversaries of the heart. The first pressure of sorrow crushes out from our hearts the best wine; afterwards the constant weight of it brings forth bitterness, the taste and strain from the lees of the vat. If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody. The counterfeit and counterpart of nature are reproduced in art. When one is truly in love, one not only says it, but shows it. One half the world must sweat and groan that the other half may dream. | 
