Edith Wharton quotes

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it. (Edith Wharton)
True originality consists not in a new manner but in a new vision. View quote
Edith Wharton
I have never known a novel that was good enough to be good in spite of its being adapted to the author's political views. View quote
Edith Wharton
The only way not to think about money is to have a great deal of it. View quote
Edith Wharton
If we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time. View quote
Edith Wharton
Habit is necessary; it is the habit of having habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive. View quote
Edith Wharton
An unalterable and unquestioned law of the musical world required that the German text of French operas sung by Swedish artists should be translated into Italian for the clearer understanding of English-speaking audiences. View quote
Edith Wharton
Another unsettling element in modern art is that common symptom of immaturity, the dread of doing what has been done before. View quote
Edith Wharton
Life is always a tightrope or a feather bed. Give me the tightrope. View quote
Edith Wharton
Beware of monotony; it's the mother of all the deadly sins. View quote
Edith Wharton
When people ask for time, it's always for time to say no. Yes has one more letter in it, but it doesn't take half as long to say. (Edith Wharton)
How much longer are we going to think it necessary to be ''American'' before (or in contradistinction to) being cultivated, being enlightened, being humane, and having the same intellectual discipline as other civilized countries. View quote
Edith Wharton
The worst of doing one's duty was that it apparently unfitted one for doing anything else. View quote
Edith Wharton
A New York divorce is in itself a diploma of virtue. View quote
Edith Wharton
Life is the only real counselor; wisdom unfiltered through personal experience does not become a part of the moral tissue. View quote
Edith Wharton
Old age, calm, expanded, broad with the haughty breadth of the universe, old age flowing free with the delicious near-by freedom of death. View quote
Edith Wharton
I wonder, among all the tangles of this mortal coil, which one contains tighter knots to undo, and consequently suggests more tugging, and pain, and diversified elements of misery, than the marriage tie. View quote
Edith Wharton
Half the trouble in life is caused by pretending there isn't any. View quote
Edith Wharton
Silence may be as variously shaded as speech. View quote
Edith Wharton
A classic is classic not because it conforms to certain structural rules, or fits certain definitions (of which its author had quite probably never heard). It is classic because of a certain eternal and irrepressible freshness. View quote
Edith Wharton
No insect hangs its nest on threads as frail as those which will sustain the weight of human vanity. (Edith Wharton)
Mrs. Ballinger is one of the ladies who pursue Culture in bands, as though it were dangerous to meet it alone. View quote
Edith Wharton
I don't know if I should care for a man who made life easy; I should want someone who made it interesting. View quote
Edith Wharton
My little old dog, a heartbeat at my feet. View quote
Edith Wharton
In spite of illness, in spite even of the archenemy sorrow, one can remain alive log past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways. View quote
Edith Wharton