“Pain was a fascinating horror”

Pt. I, ch. 2
Confession (1882)
Context: I cannot recall those years without horror, loathing, and heart-rending pain. I killed people in war, challenged men to duels with the purpose of killing them, and lost at cards; I squandered the fruits of the peasants' toil and then had them executed; I was a fornicator and a cheat. Lying, stealing, promiscuity of every kind, drunkenness, violence, murder — there was not a crime I did not commit... Thus I lived for ten years.

Guardian Galenor in Ch 43 : various pursuits<!-- 418 -->
The Visitor (2002)
Context: People allow themselves to believe an event if it's called a miracle while disdaining the same event if it's called magic. Or vice versa. Life arises naturally; where life is, death is, joy is, pain is. Where joy and pain are, ecstasy and horror are, all part of the pattern. They occur as night and day occur on a whirling planet. They are not individually willed into being and shot at persons like arrows. Mankind accepts good fortune as his due, but when bad occurs, he thinks it was aimed at him, done to him, a hex, a curse, a punishment by his deity for some transgression, as though his god were a petty storekeeper, counting up the day's receipts…

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

Source: Heart of Darkness

Mutation. A Sonnet http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16341/16341-h/16341-h.htm#page73 (1824)

Statement to World Artists : 1950-1980 as quoted n "Grace Hartigan, 86, Abstract Painter, Dies" in The New York Times (18 November 2008)
Unsourced variant: I have found "my subject", it concerns that which is vital and vulgar in American life and the possibility of its transcendence into the beautiful.

Source: Sense and Sensibility

Source: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch