We Americans are as little neutrals as possible where any aptitude for any action, of whatever kind, that affirms life and freshly and inventively exemplifies it, instead of overwhelming and undermining it, is concerned.
"Within the Rim and Other Essays"
Henry James
But Lydia, changed the subject, entered upon a discussion, so inventively artistic, of the new bonnet, and the new dress in which her mother was to appear on Whitsunday, that when bedtime came Mrs. Penfold had seldom passed a pleasanter evening.
"The Mating of Lydia"
Mrs. Humphry Ward
It was long after my acquaintance with his work that I came to a due sense of Irving as an artist, and perhaps I have come to feel a full sense of it only now, when I perceive that he worked willingly only when he worked inventively.
"Literature and Life"
William Dean Howells