“What's the use of crying, and retching, and belching, all day long, like your lady downstairs? Life has its sad side, and we must take the rough with the smooth. Why, maids have died on their marriage eve, or, what's worse, bringing their first baby into the world, and the world's wagged on all the same. Life's sad enough, in all conscience, but there's nothing to be frightened about in it or to turn one's stomach. I was country-bred, and as my old granny used to say, "There's no clock like the sun and no calendar like the stars." And why? Because it gets one used to the look of Time. There's no bogey from over the hills that scares one like Time. But when one's been used all one's life to seeing him naked, as it were, instead of shut up in a clock, like he is in Lud, one learns that he is as quiet and peaceful as an old ox dragging the plough. And to watch Time teaches one to sing. They say the fruit from over the hills makes one sing. I've never tasted so much as a sherd of it, but for all that I can sing.” LifeWisdomHappinessDeathTimeSadness Book:Lud-in-the-Mist Source: Lud-in-the-Mist
“just as tunes once gay inevitably become plaintive when the generation that first sang them has turned to dust․” LifeGrowthMusicGeneration Book:Lud-in-the-Mist Source: Lud-in-the-Mist
“He could not stand people saying, "Who knows what we shall be doing this time next year?" and he loathed such expressions as "for the last time," "never again"..” LifeNeverLud In The MistHope Mirrlees Book:Lud-in-the-Mist Source: Lud-in-the-Mist
“The narrow zone of color created by the firelight was like the planet Earth―a little freak of brightness in a universe of impenetrable shadows.” LifeEarthUniverseDarknessFireColorShadows Book:Lud-in-the-Mist Source: Lud-in-the-Mist
