William Makepeace Thackeray Quotes
-
There's a great power of imagination about these little creatures, and a creative fancy and belief that is very curious to watch . . . I am sure that horrid matter-of-fact child-rearers . . . do away with the child's most beautiful privilege. I am determined that Anny shall have a very extensive and instructive store of learning in Tom Thumbs, Jack-the-Giant-Killers, etc.
-
If a man has committed wrong in life, I don't know any moralist more anxious to point his errors out to the world than his own relations.
-
The affection of young ladies is of as rapid growth as Jack's beanstalk, and reaches up to the sky in a night.
-
To see a young couple loving each other is no wonder; but to see an old couple loving each other is the best sight of all.
-
You must not judge hastily or vulgarly of Snobs: to do so shows that you are yourself a Snob.
-
Never lose a chance of saying a kind word. As Collingwood never saw a vacant place in his estate but he took an acorn out of his pocket and planted it, so deal with your compliments through life. An acorn costs nothing, but it may spread into a prodigious timber.
-
You read the past in some old faces.
-
An intelligent wife can make her home, in spite of exigencies, pretty much what she pleases.
-
If a secret history of books could be written, and the author's private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader!
-
Next to excellence is the appreciation of it.
-
People hate as they love, unreasonably.
-
To be beautiful is enough! if a woman can do that well who should demand more from her? You don't want a rose to sing.
-
It is impossible, in our condition of Society, not to be sometimes a Snob.
-
To be rich, to be famous? do these profit a year hence, when other names sound louder than yours, when you lie hidden away under ground, along with the idle titles engraven on your coffin? But only true love lives after you, follows your memory with secret blessings or pervades you, and intercedes for you. Non omnis moriar, if, dying, I yet live in a tender heart or two; nor am lost and hopeless, living, if a sainted departed soul still loves and prays for me.
-
Who has not remarked the readiness with which the closest of friends and honestest of men suspect and accuse each other of cheating when they fall out on money matters? Everybody does it. Everybody is right, I suppose, and the world is a rogue.
-
Might I give counsel to any man, I would say to him, try to frequent the company of your betters. In books and in life, that is the most wholesome society; learn to admire rightly; the great pleasure of life is that. Note what great men admire.
-
If fun is good, truth is still better, and love best of all.
-
We have only to change the point of view and the greatest action looks mean.
-
Frequent the company of your betters.
-
A clever, ugly man every now and then is successful with the ladies, but a handsome fool is irresistible.
-
He first selected the smallest one...and then bowed his head as though he were saying grace. Opening his mouth very wide, he struggled for a moment, after which all was over. I shall never forget the comic look of despair he cast upon the other five over-occupied shells. I asked him how he felt. 'Profoundly grateful,' he said, 'as if I had swallowed a small baby.'
-
'No business before breakfast, Glum!' says the King. 'Breakfast first, business next.'
-
And in those varieties of pain of which we spoke anon, what a part of confidante has that poor teapot played ever since the kindly plant was introduced among us! What myriads of women have cried over it, to be sure! What sickbeds it has smoked by! What fevered lips have received refreshment from out of it! Nature meant very gently by women when she made that teaplant; and with a little thought what a series of pictures and groups the fancy may conjure up and assemble round the teapot and cup!
-
Where is truth, forsooth, and who knoweth it? Is Beauty beautiful, or is it only our eyes that make it so? Does Venus squint? Has she got a splay-foot, red hair, and a crooked back? Anoint my eyes, good Fairy Puck, so that I may ever consider the Beloved Object a paragon! Above all, keep on anointing my mistress's dainty peepers with the very strongest ointment, so that my noddle may ever appear lovely to her, and that she may continue to crown my honest ears with fresh roses!