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“With those legions, he (Antonius) would be invincible; and the world would lie like an unguarded treasure house before his plundering ambition. We simply faced the death of Rome for which Cesar had given his life.”

“ how do you oppose a foe who is wholly irrational and unpredictable-and yet who out of animal energy, and the accident of circumstance, hesitate to the most frightening power?”

“ it is still possible to lead a decent life in the privacy of one’s own heart and mind”(27). Atia, Augustus’s mother, as she urges him to reflect on the meaning of his father’s death and what it means for his own future.

“ I have conquered the world, and none of it is secure; I have shown liberty to the people, and they flee it as if it were a disease; I despise those whom I can trust, and love those best who would most quickly betray me. And I do not know where we are going, though I lead a nation to its destiny.”

“ from what source does that lie suck its energy, so that it grows strong stronger than the truth? We have seen murder, theft, and pillage in the name of the Republic-and call it the necessary price we pay for freedom”(18).

“ how all the pain in English enjoy merge together, and even the ugly and dead seem beautiful, and even the fear of death and defeat are like the steps of a game!”

“But there is much that cannot go into books, and that is the loss with which I become increasingly concerned”(16).

But now he is Emperor of the world, and I must look beyond that to see him as he was then; and I swear to you that I, whose service to him has been my knowledge of the hearts of both his friends and enemies, could not have foreseen what he was to become(15).

Perhaps we are wiser when we are young, though the philosopher would dispute with me. But I swear to you, we were friends from that moment onward; and that moment of foolish laughter was a bond stronger than anything that came between us later- victories or defeats, loyalties or betrayals, griefs or joys. But the days of youth go, and part of us goes with them, not to re-turn(13).

“Overtime, our sense of who we are can be irrevocably altered by circumstance and accident” (ix).

Through this twilight universe Daisy began…keeping half a dozen dates a day …drowsing asleep at dawn with the beads and chiffon of an evening dress tangled among dying orchids on the floor beside her bed. And all the time something within her was crying for a decision. She wanted her life shaped now, immediately—and the decision must be made by some force—of love, of money, of unquestionable practicality”

“They had never been closer in their month of love nor communicated more profoundly one with another than when she brushed silent lips against his coat's shoulder or when he touched the end of her fingers, gently, as though she were asleep.”

“ All these years, they’ve been two little plants, sharing the same plot of soil, growing around one another, contorting to make room, taking certain unlikely positions. But in the end, she has done something for him, she’s made a new life possible, and she can always feel good about that.@

“ She knows he loves her, she doesn’t wonder about that anymore.”

Marianne had a wildness that got into him for a while, and made him feel that he was like her, that they had the same unnameable spiritual journey, and that neither of them could ever fit into the world. But he was never damaged like she was. She just made him feel that way.

Sometimes my rages and devastations feel as intense as Mrs. Linton’s however seeing it on the page makes me laugh! It is all together beautiful and terrifying to go insane. 💖 I really felt those fits, girl. Completely insane, and I totally felt that.