Here, selected from more, are a few "fire-flies,"--not dancing or distracted, but authentic all, and stuck each on its spit; shedding a feeble glimmer over the physiognomy of those Fifteen caliginous Months, to an imagination that is diligent. Fractional utterances of Voltaire to Friedrich and others (in abridged form, abridgment indicated): the exact dates are oftenest irretrievably gone; but the glimmer of light is indisputable, all the more as, on Voltaire's part, it is mostly involuntary. Grouping and sequence must be other than that of Time.英文原著 · 《History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 16》
Besides, there is a quiet modesty about the sketch which is itself taking. To attempt the complete even in a fractional bit of the cosmos, like a picture, has in it a difficulty akin to the logical one of proving a universal negative. The possibilities of failure are enormously increased, and failure is less forgiven for the assumption. Art might perhaps not unwisely follow the example of science in such matters where an exhaustive work, which takes the better part of a lifetime to produce, is invariably entitled by its erudite author an Elementary Treatise on the subject in hand.英文原著 · 《The Soul of the Far East》