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At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity.

E. M. Forster

Only a writer who has the sense of evil can make goodness readable.
E. M. FORSTER

Evil Makem Goodness Readable Sense Writer
There are moments when the inner life actually ‘pays,’ when years of self-scrutiny, conducted for no ulterior motive, are suddenly of practical use.
E. M. FORSTER

Actual Conduct Inner Life Moment Motive Pay Scrutiny Self Suddenly Use Year
One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life.
E. M. FORSTER

Fond Life Make Mess Must One People Trust
The main facts in human life are five: birth, food, sleep, love and death.
E. M. FORSTER

Death Fact Fivem Birth Food Human Life Main Sleep
Faith, to my mind, is a stiffening process, a sort of mental starch, which ought to be applied as sparingly as possible. I dislike the stuff. I do not believe in it, for its own sake, at all… My lawgivers are Erasmus and Montaigne, not Moses and St Paul.
E. M. FORSTER

Apply Faith Mental Mind Ought Possible Process Sort Starch Stiffening Straight
Nonsense and beauty have close connections.
E. M. FORSTER

Beauty Close Connection Nonsense
The sort of poetry I seek only resides in objects Man can’t touch – like England ‘s grass network of lanes 100 years ago, but today he can destroy them and only Lord Farrer keeps him from doing it.
E. M. FORSTER

Ago Country Destroy Grass Hundred Lane Man Network Object Poetry Reason Seek Sort Them Today Touch Year
Do not be proud of your inconsistency. It is a pity, it is a pity that we should be equipped like this. It is a pity that Man cannot be at the same time impressive and truthful.
E. M. FORSTER

Equipped Impressive Inconsistency Pity Proud Same
But Humanity, in its desire for comfort, had over-reached itself. It had exploited the riches of nature too far. Quietly and complacently, it was sinking into decadence, and progress had come to mean the progress of the Machine.
E. M. FORSTER

Comfort Desire Humanity Itself Over Reach
For it is a serious thing to have been watched. We all radiate something curiously intimate when we believe ourselves to be alone.
E. M. FORSTER

Alone Been Believe Curiously Intimate Ourselves Radiate Serious Something Thing Watch
I believe in teaching people to be individuals, and to understand other individuals.
E. M. FORSTER

Believe Individual People Teach Understand
One of the evils of money is that it tempts us to look at it rather than at the things that it buys.
E. M. FORSTER

Buy Evil Look Money One Rather Tempt Thing
It was pleasant, too, to fling wide the windows, pinching the fingers in unfamiliar fastenings, to lean out into sunshine with beautiful hills and trees and marble churches opposite, and, close below, Arno, gurgling against the embankment of the road.
E. M. FORSTER

Beautiful Embankment Fastening Hill Opposite Pinch Pleasant Road Tree Unfamiliar Wide
You confuse what’s important with what’s impressive.
E. M. FORSTER

Confuse Important Impressive
Life is sometimes life and sometimes only a drama, and one must learn to distinguish t’other from which . . .
E. M. FORSTER

Distinguish Drama Learn Life Something
If we act the truth the people who really love us are sure to come back to us in the long run
E. M. FORSTER

Act Back Long Love People Really Run Some Sure Truth

At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity.

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At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity.

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Popular Authors

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