Eliot, George

"There is no despair so absolute as that which comes with the first moments of our first great sorrow, when we have not yet known what it is to have suffered and be healed, to have despaired and have recovered hope."

"Pain is no evil unless it conquers us."

"Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving in words evidence of the fact."

"Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds." - Adam Bede

"We hand folks over to God's mercy, and show none ourselves." - Adam Bede

"Men's men: gentle or simple, they're much of a muchness." - Daniel Deronda

"The strongest principle of growth lies in the human choice." - Daniel Deronda

"A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections." - Daniel Deronda

"An election is coming. Universal peace is declared, and the foxes have a sincere interest in prolonging the lives of the poultry." - Felix Holt

"Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact." - Impressions of Theophrastus Such

"Opposition may become sweet to a man when he has christened it persecution." - Janet's Repentance

"But what we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope." - Middlemarch

"One must be poor to know the luxury of giving." - Middlemarch

"If we had a keen vision of all that is ordinary in human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow or the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which is the other side of silence." - Middlemarch

"Among all forms of mistake, prophecy is the most gratuitous." - Middlemarch

"If youth is the season of hope, it is often so only in the sense that our elders are hopeful about us; for no age is so apt as youth to think its emotions, partings, and resolves are the last of their kind." - Middlemarch

"Little children are still the symbol of the eternal marriage between love and duty." - Romola

"Animals are such agreeable friends - they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms." - Scenes of Clerical Life

"Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand." - Silas Marner

"Anger and jealousy can no more bear to lose sight of their objects than love." - The Mill on the Floss

"I've never any pity for conceited people, because I think they carry their comfort about with them." - The Mill on the Floss

"The happiest women, like the happiest nations, have no history." - The Mill on the Floss