The Mysterious Mr. Quin

You say your life is your own. But can you dare to ignore the chance that you are taking part in a gigantic drama under the orders of a divine Producer? Your cue may not come till the end of the play--it may be totally unimportant, a mere walking-on part, but upon it may hang the issues of the play if you do not give the cue to another player. The whole edifice may crumple. You as you, may not matter to anyone in the world, but you as a person in a particular place may matter unimaginably.

Sometimes one sees things clearly years afterwards than one could possibly at the time.

Is death the greatest evil that can happen to anyone?

In moments of great stress, the mind focuses itself upon some quite unimportant matter which is remembered long afterwards with the utmost fidelity, driven in, as it were, by the mental stress of the moment. It may be some quite irrelevant detail, like the pattern of a wallpaper, but it will never be forgotten.

The longer the time that has elapsed, the more things fall into proportion. One sees them in their true relationship to one another.

To get at the cause for a thing, we must study the effect.

Nobody knows what another person is thinking. They may imagine they do, but they are nearly always wrong.

There are, of course, the people who revolve around themselves--but I agree with you, she's not one of that kind. She's totally uninterested in herself. And yet she's got a strong character--there must be something. I thought at first it was her art--but it isn't. I've never met anyone so detached from life. That's dangerous.' 'Dangerous? What do you mean?' 'Well, you see--it must mean an obsession of some kind, and obsessions are always dangerous.

Sixty-nine was an interesting age--an age of infinite possibilities--an age when at last the experience of a lifetime was beginning to tell. But to feel old--that was different, a tired, discouraged state of mind when one was inclined to ask oneself depressing questions. What was he after all? A little dried-up elderly man, with neither chick nor child, with no human belongings, only a valuable Art collection which seemed at the moment strangely unsatisfying. No one to care whether he lived or died...

I mean that success has come early. And that is dangerous. Always dangerous.

You may put it that way if you like—but damn it all, it’s my life. I’ve a right to do what I like with it.” “That is a cliché,” said Mr. Satterthwaite wearily.

The eye is diverted from the real business, it is caught by the spectacular action that means nothing--nothing at all.

She's very selfish. Not exactly self-centered, but totally indifferent to everyone and everything. Don't you agree?' 'I don't think that's possible,' said Mr Satterthwaite, slowly. 'I mean everyone's interest must go somewhere.

He was not fond of young people in herds. He thought them uninteresting and crude.

What was he after all? A little dried-up elderly man, with neither chick nor child, with no human belongings, only a valuable Art collection which seemed at the moment strangely unsatisfying. No one to care whether he lived or died… At this point in his meditations Mr Satterthwaite pulled himself up short. What he was thinking was morbid and unprofitable. He knew well enough, who better, that the chances were that a wife would have hated him or alternatively that he would have hated her, that children would have been a constant source of worry and anxiety, and that demands upon his time and affection would have worried him considerably. ‘To be safe and comfortable,’ said Mr Satterthwaite firmly–that was the thing. The

¿Quién puede afirmar que aquel niño no podría haberse convertido en un gran músico o en el descubridor de la vacuna contra el cáncer? O algo menos melodramático: podría convertirse en una persona feliz y normal...

The evidence of history is against you. The contemporary historian never writes such a true history as the historian of a later generation. It is a question of getting the true perspective, of seeing things in proportion.

Thought is yours only. Nobody can alter or influence the use you mean to make of it.

... suppose if something very terrible had happened, so terrible as to be almost unbearable, one might get like that. One might run away from reality into a half world of one's own and then, of course, after a time, one wouldn't be able to get back...

one of the worst things in the world today, the unkindness of woman to woman. You

He was clearly marked with the stamp of the Philistine.