To be candid, in Middlemarch phraseology, meant, to use an early opportunity of letting your friends know that you did not take a cheerful view of their capacity, their conduct, or their position; and...
When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of, but our severity.
She locked herself in her room. She needed time to get used to her maimed consciousness, her poor lopped life, before she could walk steadily to the place allotted her. A new searching light had falle...
Our deeds determine us as much as we determine our deeds.
Her lips trembled, and so did his. It was never known which lips were the first to move towards the other lips; but they kissed tremblingly, and then they moved apart.The rain was dashing against the...
A bit o' bread's what I like from one year's end to the other; but men's stomachs are made so comical, they want a change--they do, I know, God help 'em.
I think I should have no other mortal wants, if I could always have plenty of music. It seems to infuse strength into my limbs and ideas into my brain. Life seems to go on without effort, when I am fi...
Little children are still the symbol of the eternal marriage between love and duty.
In the vain laughter of folly wisdom hears half its applause.
Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest.
Wear a smile and have friends wear a scowl and have wrinkles.
Saints and martyrs had never interested Maggie so much as sages and poets.
People are almost always better than their neighbors think they are.
I desire no future that will break the ties with the past.
In every parting there is an image of death.
O may I join the choir invisibleOf those immortal dead who live againIn minds made better by their presence; liveIn pulses stirred to generosity,In deeds of daring rectitude...
Doubtless some ancient Greek has observed that behind the big mask and the speaking-trumpet, there must always be our poor little eyes peeping as usual and our timorous lips more or less under anxious...
The devil tempts us not; 'tis we who tempt him, beckoning his skill with opportunity.
Science is properly more scrupulous than dogma. Dogma gives a charter to mistake, but the very breath of science is a contest with mistake, and must keep the conscience alive.
It is a mere cowardice to seek safety in negations. No character becomes strong in that way. You will be thrown into the world some day and then every rational satisfaction your nature that you deny n...