George Eliot

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

Every woman is supposed to have the same set of motives, or else to be a monster.

The important work of moving the world forward does not wait to be done by perfect men.

Genius at first is little more than a great capacity for receiving discipline.

I’ve never any pity for conceited people, because I think they carry their comfort about with them.

Different taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.

The revelation of Thought takes men out of servitude into freedom.

I never think at all when I write. Nobody can do two things at the same time and do them both well.

The older we grow the greater becomes our wonder at how much ignorance one can contain without bursting one’s clothes.

The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want and if they can’t find them, make them.

Be better. Be better at everything. Be better fathers… Men can be better husbands, which is – be a part of your family’s life. Do the dishes. Don’t babysit your children. You don’t babysit your own children. Be engaged. Don’t just think going to work and coming home makes you a man. Being a father, being engaged, all that stuff is important. Be a better employer. When you are sitting at a seat of power at a table of any kind and you look around you just see you, it’s just you and a bunch of men around a table, on a golf course, making deals, and you allow that to happen, and you’re okay with that – be better.

Wisdom is not wisdom when it is derived from books alone.

Disappointment, when it involves neither shame nor loss, is as good as success; for it supplies as many images to the mind, and as many topics to the tongue.

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.

I think I have a good deal of my Uncle Theodore in me, because I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on.

Not even the Devil can call a woman “Slut” if he is not able to make her fall in love.

Let us consider that we are all partially insane. It will explain us to each other; it will unriddle many riddles; it will make clear and simple many things which are involved in haunting and harassing difficulties and obscurities now.

Each thought is a nail that is driven In structures that cannot decay; And the mansion at last will be given To us as we build it each day.

Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.

Opening amenities are often opening inanities.

One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself, and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals.