George Eliot

I'm proof against that word failure. I've seen behind it. The only failure a man ought to fear is failure of cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.

There is only one failure in life possible, and that is not to be true to the best one knows.

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

It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are thoroughly alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger after them.

We cannot help the way in which people speak of us . . .

I fear that in this thing many rich people deceive themselves. They go on accumulating the means but never using them; making bricks, but never building.

Our words have wings but fly not where we would.

It's no use filling your pocket with money if you have got a hole in the corner.

It's but little good you'll go a-water-ing the last year's crop.

Blessed is the man who having nothing to say abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.

Speech may be barren but it is ridiculous to suppose that silence is always brooding on a nestful of eggs.

Opposition may become sweet to a man when he has christened it persecution.

He was like a cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow.

Might could would-they are contemptible auxiliaries.

The desire to conquer is itself a sort of subjection.

Blessed is the man who having nothing to say abstains from giving wordy evidence of the fact.

There is nothing will kill a man so soon as having nobody to find fault with but himself.

A fool or idiot is one who expects things to happen that never can happen.