dom. It was Seldon’sdistinction that he had never forgotten the way out.” (Wharton,House of Mirth) Lily’s prison was self-inflicted; while societymay lead to this feeling, much like depression may lead tosuicide; imprisonment stems from the individual, from a reactionto the society or institution they are in. If one had thestrength and moral fiber they could find the way out; however,for many prison, “... secures [one] in the world, which [they]profess to have renounced, but in fact cherished to the end of[their] life.”(E.W. Extro. Life, Dwight)On the issue of love and societal restrictions from thatWharton has been quoted as saying“...Past the alien faces of antique civilizations and thefamiliar wonders of Greece, till I swam upon the fiercelyrushing tide of the Middle Ages, with its swirling eddies ofpassion, its heaven-reflecting pools of poetry and art...Therhythmic blow of the craftsmen’s hammers in the goldsmiths’workshops and on the walls of the churches, the party cries ofarmed factions in the narrow streets, the organ roll of Dante’sverse, the crackle of fagots around the Arnold of Brescia, thetwitter of the swallows to which St. Francis preached, thelaughter of the ladies listening on the hillside to the quips ofthe Deamerin, while the plague-struck Florence howled beneaththem--all this and much more I heard, joined in such strangeunison with the voices earlier and more remote, fierce,passionate, or tender, yet subdued to such awful harmony that Ithought of the song that the morning stars sang together andfelt of though it were sounding in my ears.My heart beat to suffocation; the tears burned my lids; thejoy, the mystery of it seemed too intolerable to be borne. Icould not understand even the words of the song; but I knew thatif there had been someone at my side who could have heard itwith me, we might have found the key together.(E.W.ExtroLife,Dwight)Wharton, just as L...
