"The bread of the stranger is bitter," says Dante, "and his staircase hard to climb." But who can know what the bitterness of dependence is so well as the poor companion of an old lady of quality?"

“The illusion which exalts us is dearer to us than ten thousand truths.”

“Ah! heavy art thou, crown of Monomakh!”

“God save us from seeing a Russian revolt, senseless and merciless. Those who plot impossible upheavals among us, are either young and do not know our people, or are hard-hearted men who do not care a straw either about their own lives or those of others.”

“Two fixed ideas can no more exist together in the moral world than two bodies can occupy one and the same place in the physical world.”

“I have come to you against my wish," she said in a firm voice: "but I have been ordered to grant your request. Three, seven, ace, will win for you if played in succession, but only on these conditions: that you do not play more than one card in twenty-four hours, and that you never play again during the rest of your life. I forgive you my death, on condition that you marry my companion, Lizaveta Ivanovna.”

“Mosalsky: Good folk! Maria Godunov and her son Feodor have poisoned themselves. We have seen their dead bodies. Why are ye silent? Cry, Long live the Tsar Dimitry Ivanovich!”