George Eliot

Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest.

I have the conviction that excessive literary production is a social offence.

What loneliness is more lonely than distrust?

A human life, I think, should be well rooted in some area of native land where it may get the love of tender kinship from the earth, for the labors men go forth to, for the sounds and accents that haunt it, for whatever will give that early home a familiar unmistakable difference amidst the future widening of knowledge. The best introduction to astronomy is to think of the nightly heavens as a little lot of stars belonging to one’s own homestead.

Great feelings will often take the aspect of error, and great faith the aspect of illusion.

A patronizing disposition always has its meaner side.

Will people ever be wise enough to refuse to follow bad leaders or to take away the freedom of other people?

Let your character be kept up the very end, just as it began, and so be consistent.

It’s all that the young can do for the old, to shock them and keep them up to date.

I had rather believe all the Fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a Mind.

The world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it cannot be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it.

To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men – that is genius.

Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them.

That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another s. We see so much only as we possess.

Ignorant people think it is the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain’t so; it is the sickening grammar that they use.

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

In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.

All professions are conspiracies against the laity.

You. too, can determine what you want. You can decide on your major objectives, targets, aims, and destination.

Blows are sarcasm’s turned stupid.

The Country is both the Philosopher’s Garden and his Library, in which he Reads and Contemplates the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God.