George Eliot Quotes

It is a sad weakness in us, after all, that the thought of a man's death hallows him anew to us; as if life were not sacred too.

It's no trifle at her time at her time of life to part with a doctor who knows her constitution.

We cannot reform our forefathers.

You youngsters nowadays think you're to begin with living well and working easy; you've no notion of running afoot before you get on horseback.

O the anguish of the thought that we can never atone to our dead for the stinted affection we gave them.

I wish always to be quoted as George Eliot.

Unhappily the habit of being offensive 'without meaning it' leads usually to a way of making amends which the injured person cannot but regard as a being amiable without meaning it.

Men and women make sad mistakes about their own symptoms, taking their vague uneasy longings, sometimes for genius, sometimes for religion, and oftener still for a mighty love.

In the ages since Adam's marriage, it has been good for some men to be alone, and for some women also.

Opinions: men's thoughts about great subjects. Taste: their thoughts about small ones: dress, behavior, amusements, ornaments.

The last refuge of intolerance is in not tolerating the intolerant.

A common fallacy: to imagine a measure will be easy because we have private motives for desiring it.

The wit of a family is usually best received among strangers.

I love words; they are the quoits, the bows, the staves that furnish the gymnasium of the mind.

trouble always seems heavier when it is only one's thought and not one's bodily activity that is employed about it.

My books don't seem to belong to me after I have once written them; and I find myself delivering opinions about them as if I had nothing to do with them.

There's many a good bit o' work done with a sad heart.

There is no sense of ease like the ease we felt in those scenes where we were born.

There's things to put up wi' in ivery place, an' you may change an' change an' not better yourself when all's said an' done.

... it is because sympathy is but a living again through our own past in a new form, that confession often prompts a response of confession.

Net the large fish and you are sure to have the small fry.

I will to make life less bitter for a few within my reach.

If you are not proud of your cellar, there is no thrill of satisfaction in seeing your guest hold up his wineglass to the light and look judicial.

When you get me a good man made out of arguments, I will get you a good dinner with reading you the cookery book.

Brothers are so unpleasant.

But how little we know what would make paradise for our neighbours! We judge from our own desires, and our neighbours themselves are not always open enough even to throw out a hint of theirs.

Receptiveness is a rare and massive power, like fortitude.

If you are to rule men, you must rule them through their own ideas.

What courage and patience are wanted for every life that aims to produce anything!

... when one's outward lot is perfect, the sense of inward imperfection is the more pressing.

He had the superficial kindness of a good-humored, self-satisfied nature, that fears no rivalry, and has encountered no contrarieties.

In the first moments when we come away from the presence of death, every other relation to the living is merged, to our feeling, in the great relation of a common nature and a common destiny.

Loquacity with tongue or pen is its own reward -- or, punishment.

... one's own faults are always a heavy chain to drag through life and one can't help groaning under the weight now and then.

The worst service, I fancy, that anyone can do for truth, is to set silly people writing on its behalf.

... the business of life shuts us up within the environs of London and within sight of human advancement, which I should be so very glad to believe in without seeing.

People who write finely must not expect to be left in repose; they will be molested with thanks, at least.

... learning to love any one is like an increase of property, -- it increases care, and brings many new fears lest precious things should come to harm.

I am feeling easy now, and you will well understand that after undergoing pain this ease is opening paradise. Invalids must be excused for being eloquent about themselves.

... happy husbands and wives can hear each other say the same thing over and over again without being tired.

But, bless us, things may be lovable that are not altogether handsome, I hope?

To most mortals there is a stupidity which is unendurable and a stupidity which is altogether acceptable - else, indeed, what would become of social bonds?

There is a sort of human paste that when it comes near the fire of enthusiasm is only baked into harder shape.

When I married Humphrey I made up my mind to like sermons, and I set out by liking the end very much. That soon spread to the middle and the beginning, because I couldn't have the end without them.

Our sense of duty must often wait for some work which shall take the place of dilettanteism [sic] and make us feel that the quality of our action is not a matter of indifference.

What people do who go into politics I can't think; it drives me almost mad to see mismanagement over only a few hundred acres.

I don't feel sure about doing good in any way now; everything seems like going on a mission to a people whose language I don't know.

... we all know the wag's definition of a philanthropist: a man whose charity increases directly as the square of the distance.

... indefinite visions of ambition are weak against the ease of doing what is habitual or beguilingly agreeable.

... the majority of us scarcely see more distinctly the faultiness of our own conduct than the faultiness of our own arguments, orthe dulness [sic] of our own jokes.