Gaudy Night (Lord Peter Wimsey, #12)

by Dorothy L. Sayers

To the innocent and candid eyes of that great scholar, no moral problem seemed ever to present itself. Of a scrupulous personal integrity, she embraced the irregularities of other people in a wide, unquestioning charity. As any student of literature must, she knew all the sins of the world by name, but it was doubtful whether she recognized them when she met them in real life. It was as though a misdemeanor committed by a person she knew was disarmed and disinfected by the contact.

To be true to one’s calling, whatever follies one might commit in one’s emotional life, that was the way to spiritual peace.

Detachment is a rare virtue, and very few people find it lovable, either in themselves or in others.

And all her subsequent instability of purpose had sprung from the determination that never again would she mistake the will to feel for the feeling itself.

Learning and literature have a way of outlasting the civilization that made them.”

Or the sturdy, curly-headed person in tweeds, with a masculine-looking waistcoat and the face like the back of a cab?

Being a great father is either a very difficult or a very sadly unrewarded profession. Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him—or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them.

“I’m afraid so. Do you know any man who sincerely admires a woman for her brains?” “Well,” said Harriet, “certainly not many.” “You may think you know one,” said Miss Hillyard, with a bitter emphasis. “Most of us think at some time or other that we know one. But the man usually has some other little axe to grind.” “Very likely,” said Harriet. “You don’t seem to have a very high opinion of men—of the male character, I mean, as such.” “No,” said Miss Hillyard, “not very high. But they have an admirable talent for imposing their point of view on society in general. All women are sensitive to male criticism. Men are not sensitive to female criticism. They despise the critics.” “Do you, personally, despise male criticism?” “Heartily,” said Miss Hillyard. “But it does damage. Look at this University. All the men have been amazingly kind and sympathetic about the Women’s Colleges. Certainly. But you won’t find them appointing women to big University posts. That would never do. The women might perform their work in a way beyond criticism. But they are quite pleased to see us playing with our little toys.”

In spite of minor incongruities and absurdities, it had shown itself to have one definite significance; it had opened up to her the vision of an old desire, long obscured by a forest of irrelevant fancies, but now standing up unmistakable, like a tower set on a hill.

Looking back upon her visit to Oxford, Harriet found that it had had an unsettling effect. She had begun to take Wimsey for granted, as one might take dynamite for granted in a munitions factory. But the discovery that the mere sound of his name still had the power to provoke such explosions in herself—that she could so passionately resent, at one and the same time, either praise or blame of him on other people’s lips—awakened a misgiving that dynamite was perhaps still dynamite, however harmless it might come to look through long custom.

Was either, or were both of these, part only of her own miserable quarrel with the world?

“The trouble is,” said the Librarian, “that everybody sneers at restrictions and demands freedom, till something annoying happens; then they demand angrily what has become of the discipline.” “You can’t exercise the old kind of discipline in these days,” said the Dean, “it’s too bitterly resented.” “The modern idea is that young people should discipline themselves,” said the Librarian. “But do they?” “No; they won’t. Responsibility bores ’em. Before the War they passionately had College Meetings about everything. Now, they won’t be bothered. Half the old institutions, like the College debates and the Third Year Play, are dead or moribund. They don’t want responsibility.”