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It seemed to Oscar, as it had seemed to young Goethe, that "the extraordinary alone survives"; the extraordinary whether good or bad; he therefore sought after the extraordinary, and naturally enough often fell into the extravagant. But how stimulating it was in London, where sordid platitudes drip and drizzle all day long, to hear someone talking brilliant paradoxes.
I remember them because the publishers, who are lovers of platitudes, quoted them, to my deep gratification, and perhaps because I had seen them before. Since then I have reviewed at least twice as many books as there are years in this record about as many, I suppose, as a book-page war-horse in racing trim could do in a month, or a week.
You see, we have the mistakes of your older countries by which we can profit. 'Bah! said the other contemptuously. 'Cant platitudes words! Since when have either nations or individuals learned from the mistakes of others? Take you three. Which of you lies closest to life? Which of you has drunk experience to the dregs? The dauber?
She seized upon Athanase, and began to lecture him with the queerest platitudes about royalist politics and religious morality.
I descended from my rhetoric to find M. Reinach asking how and when this greater Britain was likely to become politically effective. "Nothing will be the same after the war." This is one of the consoling platitudes with which people cover over voids of thought. They utter it with an air of round-eyed profundity.
He discoursed platitudes about the coming year and the duties it entailed on his congregation. Owing to the length of the sermon and the lateness of the hour, the people yawned and turned uneasily in their seats. But no one ventured to leave the church, although the sermon lasted close on an hour.
On the platform with the bishop and other notables, both men and women, sat Mrs. Swinton, and she sighed with unspeakable weariness. It had been one of those dull, monotonous, clerical days, replete with platitudes, the tedium of custom, and all the petty ceremonies and observances that she hated. She returned home worn out physically, and mentally benumbed.
But instead of the expected customary words and illustrations technical theological hair-splitting and dreary platitudes He began to preach in a manner unknown to the Nazarenes. His opening sentence broke the silence and greatly startled and disturbed the congregation. "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears," were his opening words.
From either side they looked at each other Freda with a wondering perplexity, Derrick with a dull grinding pain at his heart. Of course they spoke to each other; but I fancy the merest platitudes passed between them. Somehow they had lost touch, and a crowded London drawing-room was hardly the place to regain it.
Everybody agreed that religion was all right; but by religion they meant some vague utterance of platitudes. On the appointed Sunday a very large crowd gathered in the Plaza. Nobody knew just what the gamblers intended to do about it. Those competent citizens were as close mouthed as ever.
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