Quotes from Charles Dickens

Actuated by no personal motives, but moved only by high and great constitutional considerations; which I will not attempt to explain, for they are really beneath the comprehension of those who have not made themselves masters, as I have, of the intricate and arduous study of politics; I would rather keep my seat, and intend doing so.

The beauty of the earth is but a breath, and man is but a shadow. What sympathy should a holy preacher have with either?

Fortune or misfortune, a man can but try; there's not to be done without trying - accept laying down and dying.

It's the whole point of the thing, you know—that, and leaving the business to take care of itself, as it seems to have made up its mind not to take care of me.

Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven,

Lucie stood stretching out her arms towards her husband, with nothing in her face but love and consolation.

I have an affection for the road ... formed in the impressibility of untried youth and hope.

if they would but think how hard it is for the very poor to have engendered in their hearts, that love of home from which all domestic virtues spring, when they live in dense and squalid masses where social decency is lost, or rather never found ... and [those who rule] strive to improve the wretched dwellings in bye-ways where only Poverty may walk ... In hollow voices from Workhouse, Hospital, and jail, this truth is preached from day to day, and has been proclaimed for years.

Whatsume'er the failings on his part, Remember reader he were that good in his hart.

Mr. Stryver then called his few witnesses, and Mr. Cruncher had next to attend while Mr. Attorney-General turned the whole suit of clothes Mr. Stryver had fitted on the jury, inside out; showing how Barsad and Cly were even a hundred times better than he had thought them, and the prisoner a hundred times worse. Lastly, came my Lord himself, turning the suit of clothes, now inside out, now outside in, but on the whole decidedly trimming and shaping them into grave-clothes for the prisoner.

She had reasons for believing that there was a young sister living, and her greatest desire was, to help that sister.

Your manners have been of that silent and sullen and hangdog kind, that, upon my life and soul, I have been ashamed of you, Sydney!

Depressed and slinking though they were, eyes of fire were not wanting among them; nor compressed lips, white with what they suppressed

It was characteristic of this lady (as of some other people before her time and since) that whenever her original proposition was questioned, she exaggerated it.

It is the fate of all authors or chroniclers to create imaginary friends, and lose them in the course of art.

had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all

And if we were not all three in fairyland, certainly I was. I lived principally on Dora and coffee. To have reason to think that when she was with other people she was yet mindful of me, seemed to me the summit of human ambition. There is no doubt whatever that I was a lackadaisical young spoony; but there was a purity of heart in all this still that prevents my having quite a contemptuous recollection of it.

Papa is a preferable mode of address', observed Mrs General. 'Father is rather vulgar, my dear. The word Papa, besides, gives a pretty form to the lips. Papa, potatoes, poultry, prunes and prism, are all very good words for the lips: especially prunes and prism. You will find it serviceable, in the formation of a demeanour, if you sometimes say to yourself in company - on entering a room, for instance - Papa, potatoes, poultry, prunes and prism.

So expressive it was, of a hopeless and lost creature, that a famished traveler, wearied out by lonely wandering in a wilderness, would have remembered home and friends in such a tone before lying down to die.

Enough House', said I; 'that's a curious name, miss.' 'Yes,' she replied; 'but it meant more than it said. It meant, when it was given, that whoever had this house could want nothing else.

When a man's his own enemy, it's only because he's too much his own friend; not because he's careful for everybody but himself. Pooh! Pooh! There ain't such a thing in nature.

Oliver has long since grown stout and healthy; but health or sickness made no difference in his warm feelings to those about him, though they do in the feelings of a great many people. He was still the same gentle, attached, affectionate creature that he had been when pain and suffering had wasted his strength; and when he was dependent for every slight attention and comfort on those who tended him.

Demon—with the highest respect for you—behold your work!

Westminster. Even the Cock-lane ghost had been laid only a round dozen of years, after rapping out its messages, as the spirits of this very year last past (supernaturally