The stability and peace which seemed to be so firmly established by the brilliant monarchy of Francis I vanished with the terrible outbreak of the Wars of Religion. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
Unlike the majority of the writers of his age, La Rochefoucauld was an aristocrat; and this fact gives a peculiar tone to his work. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
When Louis XIV assumed the reins of government France suddenly and wonderfully came to her maturity; it was as if the whole nation had burst into splendid flower. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
The history of the Victorian Age will never be written: we know too much about it. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
When the French nation gradually came into existence among the ruins of the Roman civilization in Gaul, a new language was at the same time slowly evolved. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
With a very few exceptions, every word in the French vocabulary comes straight from the Latin. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
There is something dark and wintry about the atmosphere of the later Middle Ages. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
The old interests of aristocracy – the romance of action, the exalted passions of chivalry and war – faded into the background, and their place was taken by the refined and intimate pursuits of peace and civilization. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
Modern as the style of Pascal’s writing is, his thought is deeply impregnated with the spirit of the Middle Ages. He belonged, almost equally, to the future and to the past. Lytton Strachey Read Quote
