George Eliot

But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.

Only those who know the supremacy of the intellectual life can understand the grief of one who falls from that serene activity into the absorbing soul-wasting struggle with worldly annoyances.

One soweth and another reapeth is a verity that applies to evil as well as good.

Breed is stronger than pasture.

But the mother’s yearning, that completest type of the life in another life which is the essence of real human love, feels the presence of the cherished child even in the debased, degraded man.

Our deeds still travel with us from afar, and what we have been makes us what we are.

Laughter is the greatest weapon we have and we, as humans, use it the least.

Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young.

The secret of culture is to learn, that a few great points steadily reappear.

The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons.

Necessity is the mother of taking chances.

Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.

If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.

You are alive, so be fully alive.

If life must not be taken too seriously, then so neither must death.

I know of no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that of tenacity of purpose.

A shoe that is too large is apt to trip one, and when too small, to pinch the feet. So it is with those whose fortune does not suit them.

The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.

Our tastes greatly alter. The lad does not care for the child’s rattle, and the old man does not care for the young man’s whore.

The less a man thinks or knows about his virtues, the better we like him.