“But to radiate the heat of the affections into a clod, which absorbs all that is poured into it, but never warms beneath the sunshine of smiles or the pressure of hand or lip,—this is the great martyrdom of sensitive beings,—most of all in that perpetual auto da fé where young womanhood is the sacrifice.”

—  Oliver Wendell Holmes

The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (1858)

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Oliver Wendell Holmes photo
Oliver Wendell Holmes 135
Poet, essayist, physician 1809–1894

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