Sanctuary

“But hitherto she had been like some young captive brought up in a windowless palace whose painted walls she takes for the actual world. Now the palace had been shaken to its base, and and through a cleft in the walls she looked out upon life.””

— Edith Wharton

“His daughter, as part of himself, came within the normal range of his solicitude; but she was an outlying region, a subject province; and Mr. Orme's was a highly centralized polity.””

— Edith Wharton

“Mrs. Peyton made no answer. She knew how much hung on the possibility of his whining the competition which for weeks past had engrossed him.””

— Edith Wharton

“The tragedy of the woman's death, and of his own share in it, were as nothing in the disaster of his bright irreclaimableness.””

— Edith Wharton

“The whole question hinged on Arthur's statement to his brother. Suppress that statement, and the claim vanished, and with it the scandal, the humiliation, the life-long burden of the woman and child dragging the name of Peyton through heaven knew what depths.””

— Edith Wharton

“She could only gather, from the silences and evasions amid which she moved, that a woman had turned up”

— Edith Wharton

“It was a part of her discernment to be aware that life is the only real counsellor, that wisdom unfiltered through personal experience does not become a part of the moral tissues.””

— Edith Wharton