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His intelligence is matched only by his kindness.
I don't understand the nuance of this "matched only by." "be matched by" means to be the same right? So I understand "He is matched by his rival" means he and his rival are the same in whatever is the subject of this conversation. But I don't understand the sentence above.
His intelligence is matched only by his kindness.
This is a way of giving praise: His intelligence is so great that nothing matches it—except his kindness, which is just as great.
My sense of ethics struggled against the reality.
Your interpretation is quite good: my ethical sense of what should be done was in conflict with what "reality" demanded should be done.
It was left to them to decide what to do.
To leave [an action] to someone means to refuse or decline to take the action oneself, so the other party must do it.
