Digestive system Quote by Virginia Woolf
““Mr Bankes expected her to answer. And she was about to say something criticizing Mrs Ramsay, how she was alarming, too, in her way, high-handed, or words to that effect, when Mr Bankes made it entirely unnecessary for her to speak by his rapture. For such it was considering his age, turned sixty, and his cleanliness and his impersonality, and the white scientific coat which seemed to clothe him. For him to gaze as Lily saw him gazing at Mrs Ramsay was a rapture, equivalent, Lily felt, to the loves of dozens of young men (and perhaps Mrs Ramsay had never excited the loves of dozens of young men). It was love, she thought, pretending to move her canvas, distilled and filtered; love that never attempted to clutch its object; but, like the love which mathematicians bear their symbols, or poets their phrases, was meant to be spread over the world and become part of the human gain. So it was indeed. The world by all means should have shared it, could Mr Bankes have said why that woman pleased him so; why the sight of her reading a fairy tale to her boy had upon him precisely the same effect as the solution of a scientific problem, so that he rested in contemplation of it, and felt, as he felt when he had proved something absolute about the digestive system of plants, that barbarity was tamed, the reign of chaos subdued.””
About This Quote
Source Novel: To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, 1927
A man's awe for a woman can be as intense as scientific discovery, turning personal admiration into a universal, shared experience.
In simple terms: Admiration can feel like a scientific breakthrough.
Recognize and share moments of profound appreciation.
Themes
Mood
Type
When to use this quote
- reading to a child
- observing art
- scientific research
- personal reflection
Key Concepts
Questions to Reflect On
- How does personal admiration influence creative work?
- Can scientific rigor coexist with emotional awe?
The comparison may romanticize scientific objectivity, overlooking emotional complexity.