Winesburg, Ohio

the truth he embraced became a falsehood.

It was the truths that made the people grotesques.

That in the beginning when the world was young there were a great many thoughts but no such thing as a truth. Man made the truths himself and each truth was a composite of a great many vague thoughts. All about in the world were the truths and they were all beautiful.

The old man had listed hundreds of the truths in his book. I will not try to tell you of all of them. There was the truth of virginity and the truth of passion, the truth of wealth and of poverty, of thrift and of profligacy, of carelessness and abandon. Hundreds and hundreds were the truths and they were all beautiful.

He had a habit of talking aloud to himself, and early in life a spirit of quiet sadness often took possession of him.

From childhood she had been inclined to fits of temper and when not angry she was often morose and silent

The figure of God was big in the hearts of men.

the importance of his own figure in some divine plan grew in his mind.

vague, half-formed thoughts took possession of them.

He remembered how God had come down out of the skies and talked to these men and he wanted God to notice and to talk to him also. A kind of feverish boyish eagerness to in some way achieve in his own life the flavor of significance that had hung over these men took possession of him. Being a prayerful man he spoke of the matter aloud to God and the sound of his own words strengthened and fed his eagerness.