“Steeped in sentiment as she lies, spreading her gardens to the moonlight, and whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age, who will deny that Oxford, by her ineffable charm, keeps ever calling us nearer to the true goal of all of us, to the ideal, to perfection, — to beauty, in a word, which is only truth seen from another side? — nearer, perhaps, than all the science of Tübingen. Adorable dreamer, whose heart has been so romantic who hast given thyself so prodigally, given thyself to sides and to heroes not mine, only never to the Philistines! home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names, and impossible loyalties!”

— Matthew Arnold

Preface to the Second Edition (1869)
Essays in Criticism (1865)

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Matthew Arnold 166

English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector… 1822–1888

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“Steeped in sentiment as she lies, spreading her gardens to the moonlight, and whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age, who will deny that Oxford, by her ineffable charm, keeps ever calling us nearer to the true goal of all of us, to the ideal, to perfection, — to beauty, in a word, which is only truth seen from another side?”

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools

nearer, perhaps, than all the science of Tübingen. Adorable dreamer, whose heart has been so romantic who hast given thyself so prodigally, given thyself to sides and to heroes not mine, only never to the Philistines! home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names, and impossible loyalties!
Preface to the Second Edition (1869)
Essays in Criticism (1865)

“Nature does nothing in vain, and in the use of means to her goals she is not prodigal.”

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) German philosopher

Third Thesis
Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View (1784)
Context: Nature does nothing in vain, and in the use of means to her goals she is not prodigal. Her giving to man reason and the freedom of the will which depends upon it is clear indication of her purpose. Man accordingly was not to be guided by instinct, not nurtured and instructed with ready-made knowledge; rather, he should bring forth everything out of his own resources.

“She is a mortal danger to all men. She is beautiful without knowing it, and possesses charms that she’s not even aware of. She is like a trap set by nature - a sweet perfumed rose in whose petals Cupid lurks in ambush! Anyone who has seen her smile has known perfection. She instills grace in every common thing and divinity in every careless gesture. Venus in her shell was never so lovely, and Diana in the forest never so graceful as my Lady when she strides through Paris!”

Edmond Rostand (1868–1918) French writer

Source: Cyrano de Bergerac

“My ideal of womanhood has always been the pioneer woman who fought and worked at her husband's side. She bore the children, kept the home fires burning; she was the hub of the family, the planner and the dreamer.”

Lucille Ball (1911–1989) American actress and businesswoman

Page 113
Love, Lucy (1996)

“The mothers of all ages are those who have suffered because others suffered; for each of them, self is less sensitive than the sense of her child. Self is not locked up in the maternal heart, there to be cherished, as it is by the egoist, or to be crushed and silenced, as it is by the Saint. In the mother, self is not lost, but loses all its evil by the passionate personal love that distributes it among sons and daughters. Perfect self-less love would perhaps be distributed through the multitude, but a mother is not perfect: nature has so much use for her—separate, family use—that she cannot let her go free from irrational, indispensable partialities and limitings, even injustices, all serving the turn of the race.”

Alice Meynell (1847–1922) English publisher, editor, writer, poet, activist

Source: Mary, the Mother of Jesus: An Essay (1912), Ch. IV. "The Mother", p. 40

“Generosity, when once she is set forward, knows not how to stop her progress; as her beauty is of that order which grows the more engaging upon nearer acquaintance.”
Nescit enim semel incitata liberalitas stare, cuius pulchritudinem usus ipse commendat.

Pliny the Younger (61–113) Roman writer

Letter 11, 3.
Letters, Book V

“So she might die here—well, she could have died anywhere, so who cared where? That didn’t interest her. Life and mystery, that interested her. Perhaps she would have been keener on death and its processes if she’d had a religious side, but to her the religions of the ages were all mixed up in her head, a ceaselessly overworked agglutination of thousands of years of responding to the fears she didn’t possess.”

Justina Robson book Natural History

Source: Natural History (2003), Chapter 30 “Communication Failure” (p. 301)

“The position of England, gentlemen, is a peculiar position in the world. England has inherited from bygone ages more, perhaps, of what was most august and venerable in those ages than any other European country, and at the same time that her traditions of the past are so rich and fruitful that all our minds and all our characters have both within our knowledge and beyond our knowledge been largely moulded by them. … geographically she stands with Europe on one side of her and America on the other, so she stands between those feudal institutions in which European society was formed, and which have given her hierarchy of class, and on the other side those principles of equality forming the basis of society in America.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Speech to the Liverpool Liberal Association (6 April 1866), quoted in The Times (7 April 1866), p. 9.
1860s

“She is a dreamer… she lives in her own world. She imagines a lot of things that suit her psyche as an actor. She is a very genuine, warm and a very sensitive person… And no denying the fact a very good learner. It has been an amazing experience to work with her; she is a perfect actress.”

Rekha (1954) Indian film actress

Comment by Muzaffar Ali said.
At 55, Rekha still an engima, an icon

“He said it was her fault.
She said it wasn't at all.
But the truth lies somewhere in the middle.”

Kate Bush (1958) British recording artist; singer, songwriter, musician and record producer

Song lyrics, The Sensual World (1989)

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