I gulped a bit of tea. ‘I bet, Dad,’ I said, ‘you give those poor old 1930s of yours a bit of a bashing.’

It was as if a stone were ground to dust; as if white sparks flew from a livid whetstone, which was his spine; as if the switchback railway, having swooped to the depths, fell, fell, fell.

[…] all other sects of Philosophers, have but like men in Cimmerian darkenesse, gropingly stumbled, now and then, upon the nature of the true God-head […]

Hester Earle and Violet Wayne were moving about the aisle with bundles of wheat-ears and streamers of ivy, for the harvest thanksgiving was shortly to be celebrated, while the vicar stood waiting for their directions on the chancel steps with a great handful of crimson gladioli.