George Eliot

Harold, like the rest of us, had many impressions which saved him the trouble of distinct ideas.

In spite of his practical ability, some of his experience had petrified into maxims and quotations.

Our passions do not live apart in locked chambers but dress in their small wardrobe of notions, bring their provisions to a common table and mess together, feeding out of the common store according to their appetite.

It is a common enough case, that of a man being suddenly captivated by a woman nearly the opposite of his ideal.

Conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course.

What do we live for; if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?

All those moments are alive in us today. We may not visit them anymore, very often, but we carry them in our DNA, our blood, our bones; informing the breadth and beauty of who we now are; our lesson to be lived.

Shut your mouth, close your lips, and say something!

Dare to live the life you have dreamed for yourself. Go forward and make your dreams come true.

Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.

A soiled baby, with a neglected nose, cannot be conscientiously regarded as a thing of beauty.

It is proved…that things cannot be other than they are, for since everything was made for a purpose, it follows that everything is made for the best purpose.

No question is so difficult to answer as that which the answer is obvious.

Do not do unto others as you expect they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.

Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.

Is not disease the rule of existence? There is not a lily pad floating on the river but has been riddled by insects. Almost every shrub and tree has its gall, oftentimes esteemed its chief ornament and hardly to be distinguished from the fruit. If misery loves company, misery has company enough. Now, at midsummer, find me a perfect leaf or fruit.

What Englishman will give his mind to politics as long as he can afford to keep a motor car?

He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.

Most people want to avoid pain, and discipline is usually painful.

Practice makes perfect, and nobody’s perfect, so why practice?

The seven deadly sins… food, clothing, firing, rent, taxes, respectability and children. Nothing can lift those seven millstones from Man’s neck but money; and the spirit cannot soar until the millstones are lifted.