self-extinguishment

Updated: May 31, 2025

Storri's imagination was like a tar barrel; accident might set fire to it, but once in the least of flame it must burn on and on, with no power of self-extinguishment, until it burned itself out. Or it was like him who, given a halter, straightway takes a horse. It is the theory of Europe that Americans are maniacs of money. European conservatism draws a money-line beyond which it will not pass.

Alfred Henry Lewis - The President: A novel