A Woman of Thirty quotes

The very walls of the high galleries of the old palace seemed to cry aloud, “Long live the Emperor!”

There was something preternatural about it⁠—it was magic at work, a counterfeit presentment of the power of God; or rather it was a fugitive image of a reign itself so fugitive.

And he the centre of such love, such enthusiasm and devotion, and so many prayers, he for whom the sun had driven the clouds from the sky, was sitting there on his horse, three paces in front of his Golden Squadron, with the grand Marshal …

“Very well, child, listen to me.

Girls are apt to imagine noble and enchanting and totally imaginary figures in their own minds; they have fanciful extravagant ideas about men, and sentiment, and life; and then they innocently endow somebody or other with all the perfections of their daydreams, and put their trust in him.

They fall in love with this imaginary creature in the man of their choice; and then, when it is too late to escape from their fate, behold their first idol, the illusion made fair with their fancies, turns to an odious skeleton.

The prisoner gave a glance to the calèche as he rode by. Brief though that glance was, he had yet time to notice the sad expression which lent an indefinable charm to the Countess’ pensive face.

Many men are deeply moved by the mere semblance of suffering in a woman; they take the look of pain for a sign of constancy or of love.

Julie herself was so much absorbed in the contemplation of the opposite cushion that she saw neither the horse nor the rider. The damaged trace meanwhile had been quickly and strongly repaired; the Count stepped into his place again;

It seemed to her, as to most innocent and inexperienced young wives, that she was herself to blame for this love which she had all unwittingly inspired. With this thought came an instinctive terror, perhaps a sense of her own helplessness before aggressive audacity.

One of a man’s strongest weapons is the terrible power of compelling a woman to think of him when her naturally lively imagination takes alarm or offence at the thought that she is followed.

The Countess bethought herself of her aunt’s advice, and made up her mind that she would not stir from her place during the rest of the journey;

A word as to M. d’Aiglemont’s destinies under the Restoration.

How many men are there whose utter incapacity is a secret kept from most of their acquaintance.

For such as these high rank, high office, illustrious birth, a certain veneer of politeness, and considerable reserve of manner, or the prestige of great fortunes, are but so many sentinels to turn back critics who would penetrate to the presence of the real man.

then, with a happy knack of its own, it draws and attaches others by the thread of the ruling passion of self-interest, keeping men of far greater abilities to play like puppets, and despising those whom it has brought down to its own level.

The petty fixed idea naturally prevails; it has the advantage of persistence over the plasticity of great thoughts.

The observer who should seek to estimate and appraise the negative values of these empty heads needs subtlety rather than superior wit for the task;

and he would cry out upon fate which had given him a sickly girl for a wife.

The executioner posed, in fact, as the victim.

All the burdens of this dreary lot fell upon the Marquise, who still must smile upon her foolish lord, and deck a house of mourning with flowers, and make a parade of happiness in a countenance wan with secret torture.

Her melancholy, deep and real though it was, was still the melancholy of a woman rich in many ways.

The Marquise d’Aiglemont was like a flower, with a dark insect gnawing at its root.

Occasionally she went into society, not to please herself, but in obedience to the exigencies of the position which her husband aspired to take.

the less clairvoyant among them would jestingly ask her what she was thinking about, as if a young wife would think of nothing but frivolity, as if there were not almost always a depth of seriousness in a mother’s thoughts.

Unhappiness, like great happiness, induces dreaming.

Sometimes as Julie played with her little Hélène, she would gaze darkly at her, giving no reply to the childish questions in which a mother delights, questioning the present and the future as to the destiny of this little one.

but still more often she lay a helpless victim of an indescribable numbing stupor, the words she heard had no meaning to her, or the thoughts which arose in her mind were so vague and indistinct that she could not find language to express them.

Balked of the wishes of her heart, realities jarred harshly upon her girlish dreams of life, but she was obliged to devour her tears.

To whom could she make complaint? Of whom be understood?

… and golden broom, the air is soft, all about you lies a sunny land, a land which casts its dreamy spell over your soul, a land of languor and of soft desire, a fair, sweet-scented country, where pain is lulled to sleep and passion wakes.

No heart is cold for long beneath its clear sky, beside its sparkling waters.

One ambition dies after another, and you sink into serene content and repose, as the sun sinks at the end of the day swathed about with purple and azure.

The Marquise was constantly put in mind of the journey made in 1814, when as yet she know nothing of love, and had been almost ready to curse it for its persistency. Countless forgotten impressions were revived.

The heart has its own memory.

A woman who cannot recollect the most important great events will recollect through a lifetime things which appealed to her feelings; and Julie d’Aiglemont found all the most trifling details of that journey laid up in her mind.

… secures the place against intrusion, he will wonder how it happened that this romantic old place was set down in a savanna of corn-land, a desert of chalk, and sand, and marl, where gaiety dies away, and melancholy is a natural product of the soil.

The voiceless solitude, the monotonous horizon line which weigh upon the spirits are negative beauties, which only suit with sorrow that refuses to be comforted.

Hither, at the close of the year 1820, came a woman, still young, well known in Paris for her charm, her fair face, and her wit;

She was twenty-six years old. At that age, with plenty of romantic illusions still left, the mind loves to dwell on the thought of death when death seems to come as a friend.

But with youth, death is coy, coming up close only to go away, showing himself and hiding again, till youth has time to fall out of love with him during this dalliance.

There is that uncertainty too that hangs over death’s tomorrow. Youth plunges back into the world of living men, there to find the pain more pitiless than death, that does not wait to strike.

Great pain, therefore, pain that arises to anguish, should be suffering so deadly, that past, present, and future are alike included in its grip, and no part of life is left sound and whole. Never afterwards can we think the same thoughts as before.

Anguish engraves itself in ineffaceable characters on mouth and brow; it passes through us, destroying or relaxing the springs that vibrate to enjoyment, leaving behind in the soul the seeds of a disgust for all things in this world.

Yet, again, to be measureless, to weigh like this upon body and soul, the trouble should befall when soul and body have just come to their full strength, and smite down a heart that beats high with life.

“Eh! monsieur, it is the source of all our woes. God laid down no law to make us miserable; but mankind, uniting together in social life, have perverted God’s work. Civilization deals harder measure to us women than nature does.

Nature imposes upon us physical suffering which you have not alleviated; civilization has developed in us thoughts and feelings which you cheat continually.

Nature exterminates the weak; you condemn them to live, and by so doing, consign them to a life of misery. The whole weight of the burden of marriage, an institution on which society is based, falls upon us;

“Duties continually!” she exclaimed, with something of impatience in her tone. “But where for me are the sentiments which give us strength to perform them?

Nothing from nothing, nothing for nothing⁠—this, monsieur, is one of the most inexorable laws of nature, physical or spiritual.

Would you have these trees break into leaf without the sap which swells the buds? It is the same with our human nature; and in me the sap is dried up at its source.”

The child went. She did not seem at all sorry to go; she did not look back; glad perhaps to escape from a sad face, and instinctively comprehending already an antagonism of feeling in its expression.

A mother’s love finds language in smiles, they are a part of the divine right of motherhood.

The Marquise could not smile. She flushed red as she felt the curé’s eyes. She had hoped to act a mother’s part before him, but neither she nor her child could deceive him.

Such a soul is not found twice in our lifetime. The future that lies before me is hideous; I know it.

A woman is nothing without love; beauty is nothing without pleasure.

And even if happiness were offered to me a second time, would not the world frown upon it? I owe my daughter an honored mother. Oh! I am condemned to live in an iron circle, from which there is but one shameful way of escape.

Her grief had been violent at first in its course, as the quoit hurled forth with all the player’s strength, and like the quoit after many oscillations, each feebler than the last, it had slackened into melancholy.

Melancholy is made up of a succession of such oscillations, the first touching upon despair, the last on the border between pain and pleasure; in youth, it is the twilight of dawn; in age, the dusk of night.

As the Marquise drove through the village in her traveling carriage, she met the curé on his way back from the church. She bowed in response to his farewell greeting, but it was with lowered eyes and averted face.

Women no longer made any impression upon him; perhaps he thought that a real passion would play too large a part in a diplomatist’s life; or perhaps that the paltry amusements of frivolity were too empty for a man of strong character.

We all of us have huge claims to strength of character.

There is no man in France, be he ever so ordinary a member of the rank and file of humanity, that will waive pretensions to something beyond mere cleverness.

Mme. Firmiani here came up to interrupt this soliloquy made up of vague, conflicting, and fragmentary thoughts which cannot be reproduced in words.

The whole charm of such musing lies in its vagueness⁠—what is it but a sort of mental haze?

“I want to introduce you to someone who has the greatest wish to make your acquaintance, after all that she has heard of you,” said the lady, taking his arm.

d’Aiglemont, a personality dominates and gives coherence to the details, informing them, blending them all in an exquisite whole. Her manner was perfectly in accord with her style of beauty and her dress.

Only to certain women at a certain age is it given to put language into their attitude.

Is it joy or is it sorrow that teaches a woman of thirty the secret of that eloquence of carriage, so that she must always remain an enigma which each interprets by the aid of his hopes, desires, or theories?

Her manner was perfectly in accord with her style of beauty and her dress. Only to certain women at a certain age is it given to put language into their attitude.

Is it joy or is it sorrow that teaches a woman of thirty the secret of that eloquence of carriage, so that she must always remain an enigma which each interprets by the aid of his hopes, desires, or theories?

The way in which the Marquise leaned both elbows on the arm of her chair, the toying of her interclasped fingers, the curve of her throat, the indolent lines of her languid but lissome body as she lay back in graceful exhaustion, as it were;

“

Perhaps, monsieur, you will find happiness, and happiness is worth more than all the brilliant things, true and false, that are said every evening in Paris.

”

A girl, as a matter of fact, has too many young illusions, she is too inexperienced, the instinct of sex counts for too much in her love for a young man to feel flattered by it.

A woman of thirty knows all that is involved in the self-surrender to be made.

Among the impulses of the first, put curiosity and other motives than love; the second acts with integrity of sentiment. The first yields; the second makes deliberate choice. Is not that choice in itself an immense flattery?

Laughter, tenderness, and jest are all permitted to her at the crossing of the ways; she has acquired the tact by which she finds all the responsive chords in a man’s nature, and skill in judging the sounds which she draws forth.

Her silence is as dangerous as her speech.

You will never read her at that age, nor discover if she is frank or false, nor how far she is serious in her admissions or merely laughing at you.

Luckless phrase that has been the ruin of many an infatuated mortal.

In France the way to love lies through self-love.

Charles went back to Mme. d’Aiglemont, and imagined that she showed symptoms of pleasure in his conversion. And then, instead of giving himself up like a boy to the joy of falling in love, he tried to play a double role.

“Madame, we must either forget our pain, or hollow out a tomb for ourselves.”

But reason always cuts a poor figure beside sentiment; the one being essentially restricted, like everything that is positive, while the other is infinite.

To set to work to reason where you are required to feel, is the mark of a limited nature. Vandenesse therefore held his peace, sat awhile with his eyes fixed upon her, then came away.

But reason always cuts a poor figure beside sentiment; the one being essentially restricted, like everything that is positive, while the other is infinite.

To set to work to reason where you are required to feel, is the mark of a limited nature.

Vandenesse therefore held his peace, sat awhile with his eyes fixed upon her, then came away.

He tried to love Platonically, came daily to breathe the air that she breathed, became almost a part of her house, and went everywhere with her, slave as he was of a tyrannous passion compounded of egoism and devotion of the completest.

Love has its own instinct, finding the way to the heart, as the feeblest insect finds the way to its flower, with a will which nothing can dismay or turn aside.

If feeling is sincere, its destiny is not doubtful.

When Charles was no longer there, when his empty chair spoke for him, regrets flocked in upon her, and she found fault with herself.

Passion makes an immense advance as soon as a woman persuades herself that she has failed somewhat in generosity or hurt a noble nature.

In love there is never any need to be on our guard against the worst in us; that is a safeguard; a woman only surrenders at the summons of a virtue. “The floor of hell is paved with good intentions,”—it is no preacher’s paradox.

Silence grows more dangerous than speech for it gives to eyes all the power of the infinite of the heavens reflected in them. And for speech, the least word has irresistible might. Is not the light infused into the voice and purple into the glances?

Is not heaven within us, or do we feel that we are in the heavens?

Vandenesse and Julie—for so she had allowed herself to be called for the past few days by him whom she loved to speak of as Charles—Vandenesse and Julie were talking together, but they had drifted very far from their original subject;

With the slow fading of the daylight, sweet thoughts seem to awaken, and soft stirrings of passion, and a mysterious sense of trouble in the midst of calm.

Nature sets before us vague images of bliss, bidding us enjoy the happiness within our reach, or lament it when it has fled.

In those moments fraught with enchantment, when the tender light in the canopy of the sky blends in harmony with the spells working within, it is difficult to resist the heart’s desires grown so magically potent. Cares are blunted, joy becomes ecstasy; pain, intolerable anguish.

Cares are blunted, joy becomes ecstasy; pain, intolerable anguish. The pomp of sunset gives the signal for confessions and draws them forth.

Silence grows more dangerous than speech for it gives to eyes all the power of the infinite of the heavens reflected in them.

And for speech, the least word has irresistible might. Is not the light infused into the voice and purple into the glances? Is not heaven within us, or do we feel that we are in the heavens?

Here were traces of suffering or of thought in her; and which is the more certain token of death when life is in blossom—physical suffering, or the malady of too early thought preying upon a soul as yet in bud? Perhaps a mother knows.

For my own part, I know of nothing more dreadful to see than an old man’s thoughts on a child’s forehead; even blasphemy from girlish lips is less monstrous.

The almost stupid stolidity of this child who had begun to think already, her rare gestures, everything about her, interested me. I scrutinized her curiously.

If, by accident, they come to know the full extent of the enormity, “Upon my word,” cry they, “I hadn’t a notion!”

This was a well-intentioned ass, in short, who could see nothing in life but deeds and documents.

Mme. de Aiglemont had been dining with M. de Vandenesse; her husband had excused himself before dinner was over, for he was taking his two children to the play.

Out in the courtyard a few dead leaves set a-dancing by some eddying gust found a voice for the night which fain had been silent.

It was, in fact, one of those sharp, frosty evenings that wring barren expressions of pity from our selfish ease for wayfarers and the poor, and fills us with a luxurious sense of the comfort of the fireside.

But the family party in the salon at that hour gave not a thought to absent servants nor houseless folk, nor to the gracious charm with which a winter evening sparkles. No one played the philosopher out of season.

Silence, solitude, night and winter lent a final touch of majesty to complete the simplicity and sublimity of this exquisite effect of nature’s contriving.

Married life is full of these sacred hours, which perhaps owe their indefinable charm to some vague memory of a better world.

A divine radiance surely shines upon them, the destined compensation for some portion of earth’s sorrows, the solace which enables man to accept life.

Hélène had reached an age when purity of soul inclines to pass over-rigid judgments.

A certain order of mind is apt to exaggerate transgression into crime; imagination reacts upon conscience, and a young girl is a hard judge because she magnifies the seriousness of the offence.

Hélène seemed to think herself worthy of no one. Perhaps there was a secret in her past life, perhaps something had happened, unintelligible to her at the time, but with gradually developing significance for a mind grown susceptible to religious influences;

You ought to have shut up the book at the proper time and gone to bed, as you promised.

If you mean to make your mark in the world, you must keep your word; let it be a second religion to you, and a point of honor.

Fox, one of the greatest English orators, was remarkable, above all things, for the beauty of his character, and the very first of his qualities was the scrupulous faithfulness with which he kept his engagements.

He sprang upon the man at the tiller, drove his dagger at him in such blind fury, that he missed him, and hurled the weapon overboard. Gomez took the helm himself, and strove to right the gallant vessel.

Tears of despair rose to his eyes, for it is harder to lose the result of our carefully-laid plans through treachery than to face imminent death.

But the more the captain swore, the less the men worked, and it was he himself who fired the alarm-gun, hoping to be heard on shore.

“His voice is music for me; and for fêtes, I devise new toilettes for him to see.

When he likes my dress, it is as if all the world admired me.

Simply for that reason I keep the diamonds and jewels, the precious things, the flowers and masterpieces of art that he heaps upon me, saying, ‘Hélène, as you live out of the world, I will have the world come to you.’

“They are children of the sea and of danger; they share the life of their parents. We have but one life, and we do not flinch from it.

We have but one life, our names are written on the same page of the book of Fate, one skiff bears us and our fortunes, and we know it.

”

A flush tells nothing, it only heightens the coloring so brilliant already; all the fires that burn within can add little light to the flame of life in eyes which only seem the brighter for the flash of a passing pain.

Nothing is so discreet as a young face, for nothing is less mobile; it has the serenity, the surface smoothness, and the freshness of a lake.

There is not character in women’s faces before the age of thirty.