William Makepeace Thackeray Quotes
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It is comparatively easy to leave a mistress, but very hard to be left by one.
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We are most of us very lonely in this world; you who have any who love you, cling to them and thank God.
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The world is full of love and pity, I say. Had there been less suffering, there would have been less kindness.
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Follow your honest convictions and be strong.
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Revenge may be wicked, but it’s natural.
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Not only is the world informed of everything about you, but of a great deal more.
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Next to eating good dinners, a healthy man with a benevolent turn of mind, must like, I think, to read about them.
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Tis hard with respect to Beauty, that its possessor should not have a life enjoyment of it, but be compelled to resign it after, at the most, some forty years lease
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When a mother, as fond mothers will; vows that she knows every thought in her daughter's heart, I think she pretends to know a great deal too much.
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The wicked are wicked, no doubt, and they go astray and they fall, and they come by their deserts; but who can tell the mischief which the very virtuous do?
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Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? or, having it, is satisfied?
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A woman with fair opportunities, and without an absolute hump, may marry WHOM SHE LIKES.
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Happy! Who is happy? Was there not a serpent in Paradise itself? And if Eve had been perfectly happy beforehand, would she have listened to the tempter?
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It seems to me one cannot sit down in that place [the Round Reading room of the British Museum] without a heart full of grateful reverence. I own to have said my grace at the table, and to have thanked Heaven for my English birthright, freely to partake of these beautiful books, and speak the truth I find there.
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Next to the very young, I suppose the very old are the most selfish.
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The true pleasure of life is to live with your inferiors.
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Learn to admire rightly; the great pleasure of life is that. Note what the great men admired; they admired great things; narrow spirits admire basely, and worship meanly.
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The pipe draws wisdom from the lips of the philosopher, and shuts up the mouth of the foolish; it generates a style of conversation, contemplative, thoughtful, benevolent, and unaffected.
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Novels are sweets. All people with healthy literary appetites love them-almost all women; a vast number of clever, hardheaded men.
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What is wanted for the nonce is, that folks should be as agreeable as possible in conversation and demeanor; so that good humor may be said to be one of the very best articles of dress one can wear in societ.
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As an occupation in declining years, I declare I think saving is useful, amusing and not unbecoming. It must be a perpetual amusement. It is a game that can be played by day, by night, at home and abroad, and at which you must win in the long run. . . . What an interest it imparts to life!.
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There are many sham diamonds in this life which pass for real, and vice versa.
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Bravery never goes out of fashion.
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For my part, I believe that remorse is the least active of all a man's moral senses,--the very easiest to be deadened when wakened, and in some never wakened at all.