I aspire to give no more than a faithful account of men and things asthey have mirrored themselves inmy mind.

-Eliot, George pseudonym of  MaryAnn Evans
  Adam Bede, ch.17.

Oh let us not be condemned for what we are. It is enough to account for what we do.

-Fenton,James
  'Children in Exile'.

Hofstadter's Law: It alwaystakeslonger thanyouexpect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law.

-Hofstadter, Douglas R(ichard)
  Go«   del, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid.

Still is thy name in high account, And still thy verse has charms, Sir David Lindesay of the Mount, Lord Lion King-at-arms!

-Scott, Sir Walter
  Marmion, canto 4, stanza 7.

Literature is the human activity that takes the fullest and most precise account of variousness, possibility, complexity, and difficulty.

-Trillin, Calvin Marshall
  The Liberal Imagination, preface.