George Eliot Quotes
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He said within his soul, ''This is the end: O'er all the earth to where the-heavens bend And hem men's travel, I have breathed my soul: I lie here now the remnant of that whole, The embers of a life, a lonely pain; As far-off rivers to my thirst were vain, So of my mighty years nought comes to me again'.
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The tread Of coming footsteps cheats the midnight watcher Who holds her heart and waits to hear them pause, And hears them never pause, but pass and die.
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Men outlive their love, but they don’t outlive the consequences of their recklessness.
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Apropos of the 'The Lifted Veil,' I think it will not be judicious to reprint it at present. I care for the idea which it embodies, and which justifies its painfulness. A motto which I wrote on it yesterday perhaps is a sufficient indication of that idea: -
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It is, I fear, but a vain show of fulfilling the heathen precept, ''Know thyself,'' and too often leads to a self- estimate which will subsist in the absence of that fruit by which alone the quality of the tree is made evident.
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Quick souls have their intensest life in the first anticipatory sketch of what may or will be, and the pursuit of their wish is the pursuit of that paradisiacal vision which only impelled them, and is left farther and farther behind, vanishing forever even out of hope in the moment which is called success.
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That farewell kiss which resembles greeting, that last glance of love which becomes the sharpest pang of sorrow.
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It belongs to every large nature, when it is not under the immediate power of some strong unquestioning emotion, to suspect itself, and doubt the truth of its own impressions, conscious of possibilities beyond its own horizon.
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It is well known to all experienced minds that our firmest convictions are often dependent on subtle impressions for which words are quite too coarse a medium.
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I am influenced at the present time by far higher considerations and by a nobler idea of duty than I ever was when I held the Evangelical belief.
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These gems have life in them: their colors speak, say what words fail of.
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In travelling I shape myself betimes to idleness And take fools' pleasure.
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That big muscular frame of his held plenty of animal courage, but helped him to no decision when the dangers to be braved were such as could neither be knocked down nor throttled.
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It is surely better to pardon too much, than to condemn too much.
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She was no longer struggling against the perception of facts, but adjusting herself to their clearest perception.
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To manage men one ought to have a sharp mind in a velvet sheath.
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You told me the truth when you said to me once, 'There's a sort of wrong that can never be made up for'.
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A blush is no language; only a dubious flag - signal which may mean either of two contradictories.
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I have no courage to write much unless I am written to. I soon begin to think that there are plenty of other correspondents more interesting - so if you all want to hear from me you know the conditions.
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The yoke a man creates for himself by wrong-doing will breed hate in the kindliest nature; . . .
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Certain winds will make men's temper bad.
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Such young unfurrowed souls roll to meet each other like two velvet peaches that touch softly and are at rest; they mingle as easily as two brooklets that ask for nothing but to entwine themselves and ripple with ever-interlacing curves in the leafiest hiding-places.
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Signs are small measurable things, but interpretations are illimitable, and in girls of sweet, ardent nature, every sign is apt to conjure up wonder, hope, belief, vast as a sky, and colored by a thimbleful of matter in the shape of knowledge....wrong reasoning sometimes lands poor mortals in right conclusions: starting a long way off the true point, and proceeding by loops and zigzags, we now and then arrive just where we ought to be. Just because Miss Brooke was hasty in her trust, it is not therefore clear that Mr. Casaubon was unworthy of it.
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She and Stephen were in that stage of courtship which makes the most exquisite moment of youth, the freshest blossom-time of passion, - when each is sure of the other's love, but no formal declaration has been made, and all is mutual divination, exalting the most trivial word, the lightest gesture, into thrills delicate and delicious as wafted jasmine scent.