Produced by David Widger
QUOTES AND IMAGES FROM GEORGE MEREDITH
THE WORKS OF GEORGE MEREDITH
PROSE
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
George Meredith in 1893
The Sitting Room, Flint Cottage--May 18th 1909
Age 35
Age 68
Age 69
Age 72
Age 80
A lover must have his delusions, just
as a man must have a skin
A madman gets madder when you talk
reason to him
A night that had shivered repose
A dash of conventionalism makes the
whole civilized world kin
A string of pearls: a woman who goes
beyond that's in danger
A wound of the same kind that we are
inflicting
A tear would have overcome him--She had
not wept
A tragic comedian: that is, a grand
pretender, a self-deceiver
A fleet of South-westerly rain-clouds
had been met in mid-sky
A bone in a boy's mind for him to gnaw
and worry
A kind of anchorage in case of
indiscretion
A cloud of millinery shoots me off a
mile from a woman
A woman's at the core of every plot man
plotteth
A witty woman is a treasure; a witty
Beauty is a power
A high wind will make a dead leaf fly
like a bird
A kindly sense of superiority
A young philosopher's an old fool!
A bird that won't roast or boil or stew
A woman, and would therefore listen to
nonsense
A male devotee is within an inch of a
miracle
A great oration may be a sedative
A very doubtful benefit
A generous enemy is a friend on the
wrong side
A woman is hurt if you do not confide
to her your plans
A woman who has mastered sauces sits on
the apex of civilization
A style of affable omnipotence about
the wise youth
A maker of Proverbs--what is he but a
narrow mind wit
A fortress face; strong and massive,
and honourable in ruin
A dumb tongue can be a heavy liar
A common age once, when he married her;
now she had grown old
A share of pity for the objects she
despised
A woman rises to her husband. But a
man is what he is
A stew's a stew, and not a boiling to
shreds
A marriage without love is dishonour
A plunge into the deep is of little
moment
A sixpence kindly meant is worth any
crown-piece that's grudged
A man to be trusted with the keys of
anything
A free-thinker startles him as a kind
of demon
A female free-thinker is one of Satan's
concubines
A wise man will not squander his
laughter if he can help it
A man who rejected medicine in
extremity
A lady's company-smile
A country of compromise goes to pieces
at the first cannon-shot
A youth who is engaged in the
occupation of eating his heart
A whisper of cajolery in season is
often the secret
A superior position was offered her by
her being silent
A contented Irishman scarcely seems my
countryman
Abject sense of the lack of a
circumference
Above all things I detest the writing
for money
Above Nature, I tell him, or, we shall
be very much below
Absolute freedom could be the worst of
perils
Accidents are the specific for averting
the maladies of age
Accounting his tight blue tail coat and
brass buttons a victory
Accounting for it, is not the same as
excusing
Accustomed to be paid for by his
country
Acting is not of the high class which
conceals the art
Active despair is a passion that must
be superseded
Add on a tired pipe after dark, and a
sound sleep to follow
Adept in the lie implied
Admirable scruples of an inveterate
borrower
Admiration of an enemy or oppressor
doing great deeds
Admires a girl when there's no married
woman or widow in sight
Adversary at once offensive and
helpless provokes brutality
Advised not to push at a shut gate
Affected misapprehensions
Affectedly gentle and unusually
roundabout opening
After forty, men have married their
habits
After five years of marriage, and
twelve of friendship
After a big blow, a very little one
scarcely counts
Agostino was enjoying the smoke of
paper cigarettes
Ah! how sweet to waltz through life
with the right partner
Ah! we're in the enemy's country now
Ah! we fall into their fictions
Aimlessness of a woman's curiosity
Alike believe that Providence is for
them
All of us an ermined owl within us to
sit in judgement
All concessions to the people have been
won from fear
All passed too swift for happiness
All women are the same--Know one, know
all
All that Matey and Browny were
forbidden to write they looked
All are friends who sit at table
All flattery is at somebody's expense
Allowed silly sensitiveness to prevent
the repair
Although it blew hard when Caesar
crossed the Rubicon
Always the shout for more produced it
("News")
Am I ill? I must be hungry!
Am I thy master, or thou mine?
Americans forgivingly remember, without
mentioning
Amiable mirror as being wilfully
ruffled to confuse
Among boys there are laws of honour and
chivalrous codes
Amused after their tiresome work of
slaughter
An edge to his smile that cuts much
like a sneer
An obedient creature enough where he
must be
An angry woman will think the worst
An incomprehensible world indeed at the
bottom and at the top
An instinct labouring to supply the
deficiencies of stupidity
An old spoiler of women is worse than
one spoiled by them!
And now came war, the purifier and the
pestilence
And so Farewell my young Ambition! and
with it farewell all true
And he passed along the road, adds the
Philosopher
And, ladies, if you will consent to be
likened to a fruit
And her voice, against herself, was for
England
And one gets the worst of it (in any
bargain)
And it's one family where the dog is
pulled by the collar
And not any of your grand ladies can
match my wife at home
And to these instructions he gave an
aim: "First be virtuous"
And not be beaten by an acknowledged
defeat
And never did a stroke of work in my
life
And life said, Do it, and death said,
To what end?
Anecdotist to slaughter families for
the amusement
Anguish to think of having bent the
knee for nothing
Anticipate opposition by initiating
measures
Any man is in love with any woman
Any excess pushes to craziness
Appealed to reason in them; he would
not hear of convictions
Appetite to flourish at the cost of the
weaker
Arch-devourer Time
Are we practical?' penetrates the bosom
of an English audience
Aristocratic assumption of licence
Arm'd with Fear the Foe finds passage
to the vital part
Arrest the enemy by vociferations of
persistent prayer
Art of despising what he coveted
Art of speaking on politics tersely
As when nations are secretly preparing
for war
As to wit, the sneer is the cloak of
clumsiness
As secretive as they are sensitive
As the Lord decided, so it would end!
"Oh, delicious creed!"
As well ask (women) how a battle-field
concerns them!
As faith comes--no saying how; one
swears by them
As if she had never heard him
previously enunciate the formula
As little trouble as the heath when the
woods are swept
As if the age were the injury!
As for titles, the way to defend them
is to be worthy of them
As fair play as a woman's lord could
give her
As for comparisons, they are flowers
thrown into the fire
As in all great oratory! The key of it
is the pathos
As becomes them, they do not look ahead
Ashamed of letting his ears be filled
with secret talk
Ask not why, where reason never was
Ask pardon of you, without excusing
myself
Assist in our small sphere; not come
mouthing to the footlights
At the age of forty, men that love love
rootedly
At war with ourselves, means the best
happiness we can have
Attacked my conscience on the cowardly
side
Automatic creature is subject to the
laws of its construction
Avoid the position that enforces
publishing
Back from the altar to discover that
she has chained herself
Bad laws are best broken
Bad luck's not repeated every day Keep
heart for the good
Bade his audience to beware of princes
Bandied the weariful shuttlecock of
gallantry
Barriers are for those who cannot fly
Be philosophical, but accept your
personal dues
Be politic and give her elbow-room for
her natural angles
Be what you seem, my little one
Be on your guard the next two minutes
he gets you alone
Be good and dull, and please everybody
Be the woman and have the last word!
Bear in mind that we are
sentimentalists--The eye is our servant
Beauchamp's career
Beautiful servicelessness
Beautiful women in her position provoke
an intemperateness
Beautiful women may believe themselves
beloved
Beauty is rare; luckily is it rare
Because you loved something better than
me
Because he stood so high with her now
he feared the fall
Because men can't abide praise of
another man
Becoming air of appropriation that made
it family history
Bed was a rock of refuge and fortified
defence
Began the game of Pull
Beginning to have a movement to kiss
the whip
Behold the hero embarked in the
redemption of an erring beauty
Being heard at night, in the nineteenth
century
Being in heart and mind the brother to
the sister with women
Belief in the narrative by promoting
nausea in the audience
Believed in her love, and judged it by
the strength of his own
Bent double to gather things we have
tossed away
Better for men of extremely opposite
opinions not to meet
Between love grown old and indifference
ageing to love
Beware the silent one of an assembly!
Beyond a plot of flowers, a gold-green
meadow dipped to a ridge
Bitten hard at experience, and know the
value of a tooth
Borrower to be dancing on Fortune's
tight-rope above the old abyss
Botched mendings will only make them
worse
Bound to assure everybody at table he
was perfectly happy
Bounds of his intelligence closed their
four walls
Boys, of course--but men, too!
Boys are unjust
Boys who can appreciate brave deeds are
capable of doing them
Braggadocioing in deeds is only next
bad to mouthing it
Brains will beat Grim Death if we have
enough of them
Brief negatives are not re-assuring to
a lover's uneasy mind
British hunger for news; second only to
that for beef
Brittle is foredoomed
Brotherhood among the select who wear
masks instead of faces
But I leave it to you
But a woman must now and then
ingratiate herself
But great, powerful London--the new
universe to her spirit
But to strangle craving is indeed to go
through a death
But the flower is a thing of the
season; the flower drops off
But you must be beautiful to please
some men
But they were a hopeless couple, they
were so friendly
But the key to young men is the
ambition, or, in the place of it.....
But love for a parent is not merely
duty
But a great success is full of
temptations
But what is it we do (excepting
cricket, of course)
But is there such a thing as happiness
But had sunk to climb on a firmer
footing
By our manner of loving we are known
By forbearance, put it in the wrong
By resisting, I made him a tyrant
By nature incapable of asking pardon
Cajoled like a twenty-year-old yahoo at
college
Call of the great world's appetite for
more (Invented news)
Calm fanaticism of the passion of love
Can you not be told you are perfect
without seeking to improve
Can believe a woman to be any age when
her cheeks are tinted
Can a man go farther than his nature?
Cannot be any goodness unless it is a
practiced goodness
Canvassing means intimidation or
corruption
Capacity for thinking should precede
the act of writing
Capricious potentate whom they worship
Careful not to smell of his office
Carry explosives and must particularly
guard against sparks
Carry a scene through in virtue's name
and vice's mask
Causes him to be popularly weighed
Centres of polished barbarism known as
aristocratic societies
Challenged him to lead up to her
desired stormy scene
Charges of cynicism are common against
all satirists
Charitable mercifulness; better than
sentimental ointment
Charity that supplied the place of
justice was not thanked
Chaste are wattled in formalism and
throned in sourness
Cheerful martyr
Childish faith in the beneficence of
the unseen Powers who feed us
Chose to conceive that he thought
abstractedly
Circumstances may combine to make a
whisper as deadly as a blow
Civil tongue and rosy smiles sweeten
even sour wine
Claim for equality puts an end to the
priceless privileges
Clotilde fenced, which is half a
confession
Cock-sure has crowed low by sunset
Cold curiosity
Cold charity to all
Come prepared to be not very well
satisfied with anything
Comfortable have to pay in occasional
panics for the serenity
Command of countenance the Countess
possessed
Commencement of a speech proves that
you have made the plunge
Common voice of praise in the mouths of
his creditors
Common sense is the secret of every
successful civil agitation
Compared the governing of the Irish to
the management of a horse
Comparisons will thrust themselves on
minds disordered
Compassionate sentiments veered round
to irate amazement
Complacent languor of the wise youth
Compliment of being outwitted by their
own offspring
Compromise is virtual death
Conduct is never a straight index where
the heart's involved
Confess no more than is necessary, but
do everything you can
Confident serenity inspired by evil
prognostications
Consciousness of some guilt when vowing
itself innocent
Consent to take life as it is
Consent of circumstances
Conservative, whose astounded state
paralyzes his wrath
Consign discussion to silence with the
cynical closure
Constitutionally discontented
Consult the family means--waste your
time
Contempt of military weapons and
ridicule of the art of war
Contemptuous exclusiveness could not go
farther
Continued trust in the man--is the
alternative of despair
Convict it by instinct without the
ceremony of a jury
Convictions we store--wherewith to
shape our destinies
Convictions are generally first
impressions
Convincing themselves that they
impersonate sagacity
Cordiality of an extreme relief in
leaving
Could we--we might be friends
Could peruse platitudes upon that theme
with enthusiasm
Could not understand enthusiasm for the
schoolmaster's career
Could the best of men be simply--a
woman's friend?
Could have designed this gabbler for
the mate
Could affect me then, without being
flung at me
Country can go on very well without so
much speech-making
Country enclosed us to make us feel
snug in our own importance
Country prizing ornaments higher than
qualities
Courage to grapple with his pride and
open his heart was wanting
Cover of action as an escape from
perplexity
Cowardice is even worse for nations
than for individual men
Crazy zigzag of policy in almost every
stroke (of history)
Creatures that wait for circumstances
to bring the change
Critical fashion of intimates who know
as well as hear
Critical in their first glance at a
prima donna
Cupid clipped of wing is a destructive
parasite
Curious thing would be if curious
things should fail to happen
Dahlia, the perplexity to her sister's
heart, lay stretched....
Damsel who has lost the third volume of
an exciting novel
Dangerous things are uttered after the
third glass
Dark-eyed Renee was not beauty but
attraction
Days when you lay on your back and the
sky rained apples
Dead Britons are all Britons, but live
Britons are not quite brothers
Death is always next door
Death within which welcomed a death
without
Death is only the other side of the
ditch
Death is our common cloak; but Calamity
individualizes
Debit was eloquent, he was unanswerable
Decency's a dirty petticoat in the
Garden of Innocence
Decent insincerity
Decline to practise hypocrisy
Dedicated to the putrid of the upper
circle
Deeds only are the title
Deep as a mother's, pure as a virgin's,
fiery as a saint's
Defiance of foes and (what was harder
to brave) of friends
Delay in thine undertaking Is disaster
of thy own making
Depending for dialogue upon perpetual
fresh supplies of scandal
Depreciating it after the fashion of
chartered hypocrites.
Desire of it destroyed it
Despises hostile elements and goes
unpunished
Despises the pomades and curling-irons
of modern romance
Determine that the future is in our
debt, and draw on it
Detestable feminine storms enveloping
men weak enough
Detested titles, invented by the
English
Developing stiff, solid, unobtrusive
men, and very personable women
Dialectical stiffness
Dialogue between Nature and
Circumstance
Did not know the nature of an oath, and
was dismissed
Didn't say a word No use in talking
about feelings
Dignitary, and he passed under the
bondage of that position
Dignity of sulking so seductive to the
wounded spirit of man
Discover the writers in a day when all
are writing!
Discreet play with her eyelids in our
encounters
Disqualification of constantly
offending prejudices
Dissent rings out finely, and approval
is a feeble murmur
Distaste for all exercise once
pleasurable
Distinguished by his not allowing
himself to be provoked
Distrust us, and it is a declaration of
war
Dithyrambic inebriety of narration
Divided lovers in presence
Do I serve my hand? or, Do I serve my
heart?
Do you judge of heroes as of lesser
men?
Dogmatic arrogance of a just but
ignorant man
Dogs die more decently than we men
Dogs' eyes have such a sick look of
love
Dose he had taken was not of the
sweetest
Drank to show his disdain of its powers
Dreaded as a scourge, hailed as a
refreshment (Scandal-sheet)
Dreads our climate and coffee too much
to attempt the voyage
Drink is their death's river, rolling
them on helpless
Dudley was not gifted to read behind
words and looks
Earl of Cressett fell from his coach-box
in a fit
Eating, like scratching, only wants a
beginning
Eccentric behaviour in trifles
Effort to be reticent concerning Nevil,
and communicative
Efforts to weary him out of his project
were unsuccessful
Elderly martyr for the advancement of
his juniors
Embarrassments of an uncongenial
employment
Emilia alone of the party was as a blot
to her
Eminently servile is the tolerated
lawbreaker
Empanelled to deliver verdicts upon the
ways of women
Empty stomachs are foul counsellors
Empty magnanimity which his uncle
presented to him
Enamoured young men have these notions
Enemy's laugh is a bugle blown in the
night
Energy to something, that was not to be
had in a market
England's the foremost country of the
globe
English antipathy to babblers
English maids are domesticated savage
animals
Enjoys his luxuries and is ashamed of
his laziness
Enthusiasm struck and tightened the
loose chord of scepticism
Enthusiasm has the privilege of not
knowing monotony
Enthusiast, when not lyrical, is
perilously near to boring
Envy of the man of positive knowledge
Equally acceptable salted when it
cannot be had fresh
Everlastingly in this life the better
pays for the worse
Every failure is a step advanced
Every woman that's married isn't in
love with her husband
Every church of the city lent its iron
tongue to the peal
Everywhere the badge of subjection is a
poor stomach
Exceeding variety and quantity of
things money can buy
Excellent is pride; but oh! be sure of
its foundations
Excess of a merit is a capital offence
in morality
Excited, glad of catastrophe if it but
killed monotony
Expectations dupe us, not trust
Explaining of things to a dull head
Externally soft and polished,
internally hard and relentless
Exuberant anticipatory trustfulness
Exult in imagination of an escape up to
the moment of capture
Eyes of a lover are not his own; but
his hands and lips are
Face betokening the perpetual smack of
lemon
Failures oft are but advising friends
Faith works miracles. At least it
allows time for them
Fantastical
Far higher quality is the will that can
subdue itself to wait
Fast growing to be an eccentric by
profession
Fatal habit of superiority stopped his
tongue
Father and she were aware of one
another without conversing
Father used to say, four hours for a
man, six for a woman
Favour can't help coming by rotation
Fear nought so much as Fear itself
Feel no shame that I do not feel!
Feel they are not up to the people they
are mixing with
Feeling, nothing beyond a lively
interest in her well-being
Feigned utter condemnation to make
partial comfort acceptable
Fell to chatting upon the nothings
agreeably and seriously
Feminine pity, which is nearer to
contempt than to tenderness
Feminine; coming when she willed and
flying when wanted
Festive board provided for them by the
valour of their fathers
Few feelings are single on this globe
Few men can forbear to tell a spicy
story of their friends
Fiddle harmonics on the sensual strings
Fine eye for celestially directed
consequences is ever haunted
Fine Shades were still too dominant at
Brookfield
Finishing touches to the negligence
Fire smoothes the creases
Fires in the grates went through the
ceremony of warming nobody
Fit of Republicanism in the nursery
Flashes bits of speech that catch men
in their unguarded corner
Flung him, pitied him, and passed on
Foamy top is offered and gulped as
equivalent to an idea
Foe can spoil my face; he beats me if
he spoils my temper
Foist on you their idea of your idea at
the moment
Fond, as they say, of his glass and his
girl
Foolish trick of thinking for herself
For 'tis Ireland gives England her
soldiers, her generals too
Forewarn readers of this history that
there is no plot in it
Forgetfulness is like a closing sea
Fortitude leaned so much upon the irony
Forty seconds too fast, as if it were a
capital offence
Found by the side of the bed,
inanimate, and pale as a sister of
death
Found it difficult to forgive her his
own folly
Found that he 'cursed better upon
water'
Fourth of the Georges
Frankness as an armour over wariness
Fretted by his relatives he cannot be
much of a giant
Friend he would not shake off, but
could not well link with
Friendship, I fancy, means one heart
between two
From head to foot nothing better than a
moan made visible
Frozen vanity called pride, which does
not seek to be revenged
Full-o'-Beer's a hasty chap
Fun, at any cost, is the one object
worth a shot
Further she read, "Which is the coward
among us?"
Generally he noticed nothing
Gentlefolks like straight-forwardness
in their inferiors
Gentleman who does so much 'cause he
says so little
Gentleman in a good state of
preservation
Get back what we give
Giant Vanity urged Giant Energy to make
use of Giant Duplicity
Give our courage as hostage for the
fulfilment of what we hope
Give our consciences to the keeping of
the parsons
Given up his brains for a lodging to a
single idea
Glimpse of her whole life in the horrid
tomb of his embrace
Gone to pieces with an injured lover's
babble
Good and evil work together in this
world
Good nature, and means no more harm
than he can help
Good nerve to face the scene which he
is certain will be enacted
Good-bye to sorrow for a while--Keep
your tears for the living
Good maxim for the wrathful--speak not
at all
Good jokes are not always good policy
Goodish sort of fellow; good horseman,
good shot, good character
Gossip always has some solid
foundation, however small
Government of brain; not sufficient
Insurrection of heart
Gradations appear to be unknown to you
Graduated naturally enough the finer
stages of self-deception
Grand air of pitying sadness
Gratitude never was a woman's gift
Gratuitous insult
Gravely reproaching the tobacconist for
the growing costliness of cigars
Greater our successes, the greater the
slaves we become
Greatest of men; who have to learn from
the loss of the woman
Grief of an ill-fortuned passion of his
youth
Grimaces at a government long-nosed to
no purpose
Grossly unlike in likeness (portraits)
Habit had legalized his union with her
Habit of antedating his sagacity
Habit, what a sacred and admirable
thing it is
Had got the trick of lying, through
fear of telling the truth
Had come to be her lover through being
her husband
Had Shakespeare's grandmother three
Christian names?
Had taken refuge in their opera-glasses
Half-truth that we may put on the mask
of the whole
Half a dozen dozen left
Half designingly permitted her trouble
to be seen
Happiness in love is a match between
ecstasy and compliance
Happy the woman who has not more to
speak
Happy in privation and suffering if
simply we can accept beauty
Hard to bear, at times unbearable
Hard enough for a man to be married to
a fool
Hard men have sometimes a warm
affection for dogs
Haremed opinion of the unfitness of
women
Hated one thing alone--which was
'bother'
Hated tears, considering them a clog to
all useful machinery
Hates a compromise
Haunted many pillows
Have her profile very frequently while
I am conversing with her
Having contracted the fatal habit of
irony
He was not alive for his own pleasure
He, by insisting, made me a rebel
He bowed to facts
He grunted that a lying clock was
hateful to him
He has been tolerably honest, Tom, for
a man and a lover
He kept saying to himself, 'to-morrow I
will tell'
He postponed it to the next minute and
the next
He prattled, in the happy ignorance of
compulsion
He was in love, and subtle love will
not be shamed and smothered
He thinks that the country must be
saved by its women as well
He is in the season of faults
He had his character to maintain
He squandered the guineas, she
patiently picked up the pence
He neared her, wooing her; and she
assented
He judged of others by himself
He is inexorable, being the guilty one
of the two
He had to shake up wrath over his
grievances
He had gone, and the day lived again
for both of them
He gave a slight sign of restiveness,
and was allowed to go
He loathed a skulker
He clearly could not learn from
misfortune
He thinks or he chews
He would neither retort nor defend
himself
He whipped himself up to one of his
oratorical frenzies
He put no question to anybody
He took small account of the operations
of the feelings
He began ambitiously--It's the way at
the beginning
He never explained
He never acknowledged a trouble, he
dispersed it
He was the prisoner of his word
He wants the whip; ought to have had it
regularly
He had wealth for a likeness of
strength
He was a figure on a horse, and naught
when off it
He did not vastly respect beautiful
women
He sinks terribly when he sinks at all
He was not a weaver of phrases in
distress
He lies as naturally as an infant sucks
He tried to gather his ideas, but the
effort was like that of a light dreamer
He runs too much from first principles
to extremes
He gained much by claiming little
He had by nature a tarnishing eye that
cast discolouration
He was too much on fire to know the
taste of absurdity
He smoked, Lord Avonley said of the
second departure
He had no recollection of having ever
dined without drinking wine
He stormed her and consented to be
beaten
He will be a part of every history (the
fool)
He was the maddest of tyrants--a weak
one
He had to go, he must, he has to be
always going
He never calculated on the happening of
mortal accidents
He had expected romance, and had met
merchandize
He condensed a paragraph into a line
He lost the art of observing himself
He had neat phrases, opinions in
packets
He's good from end to end, and beats a
Christian hollow (a hog)
Hear victorious lawlessness appealing
solemnly to God the law
Heart to keep guard and bury the bones
you tossed him
Heartily she thanked the girl for the
excuse to cry
Hearts that make one soul do not
separately count their gifts
Heathen vindictiveness declaring itself
holy
Heights of humour beyond laughter
Her intimacy with a man old enough to
be her grandfather
Her vehement fighting against facts
Her peculiar tenacity of the sense of
injury
Her feelings--trustier guides than her
judgement in this crisis
Her final impression likened him to a
house locked up and empty
Her aspect suggested the repose of a
winter landscape
Her singing struck a note of grateful
remembered delight
Her duel with Time
Here, where he both wished and wished
not to be
Here and there a plain good soul to
whom he was affectionate
Hermits enamoured of wind and rain
Hero embarked in the redemption of an
erring beautiful woman
Heroine, in common with the hero, has
her ambition to be of use
Herself, content to be dull if he might
shine
Hesitating strangeness that sometimes
gathers during absences
Himself in the worn old surplice of the
converted rake
His aim to win the woman acknowledged
no obstacle in the means
His idea of marriage is, the taking of
the woman into custody
His gaze and one of his ears, if not
the pair, were given
His ridiculous equanimity
His alien ideas were not unimpressed by
the picture
His restored sense of possession
His wife alone, had, as they termed it,
kept him together
His equanimity was fictitious
His fancy performed miraculous feats
His violent earnestness, his imperial
self-confidence
His apparent cynicism is sheer
irritability
Holding to the refusal, for the sake of
consistency
Holding to his work after the strain's
over--That tells the man
Holy images, and other miraculous
objects are sold
Honest creatures who will not accept a
lift from fiction
Hope which lies in giving men a dose of
hysterics
Hopeless task of defending a woman from
a woman
Hopes of a coming disillusion that
would restore him
Hosts of men are of the simple order of
the comic
How angry I should be with you if you
were not so beautiful!
How Success derides Ambition!
How many degrees from love gratitude
may be
How immensely nature seems to prefer
men to women!
How little a thing serves Fortune's
turn
How to compromise the matter for the
sake of peace?
How many instruments cannot clever
women play upon
How little we mean to do harm when we
do an injury
Hug the hatred they packed up among
their bundles
Human nature to feel an interest in the
dog that has bitten you
Humour preserved her from excesses of
sentiment
Huntress with few scruples and the game
unguarded
Hushing together, they agreed that it
had been a false move
I do not defend myself ever
I have learnt as much from light
literature as from heavy
I have and hold--you shall hunger and
covet
I cannot get on with Gibbon
I could be in love with her cruelty, if
only I had her near me
I married a cook She expects a big
appetite
I want no more, except to be taught to
work
I detest anything that has to do with
gratitude
I know nothing of imagination
I haven't got the pluck of a flea
I hate old age It changes you so
I would cut my tongue out, if it did
you a service
I can't think brisk out of my breeches
I look on the back of life
I never pay compliments to transparent
merit
I always respected her; I never liked
her
I give my self, I do not sell
I cannot live a life of deceit. A life
of misery--not deceit
I was discontented, and could not speak
my discontent
I laughed louder than was necessary
I had to cross the park to give a
lesson
I cannot delay; but I request you, that
are here privileged
I ain't a speeder of matrimony
I beg of my husband, and all kind
people who may have the care
I rather like to hear a woman swear.
It embellishes her!
I can confess my sight to be imperfect:
but will you ever do so?
I do not think Frenchmen comparable to
the women of France
I take off my hat, Nan, when I see a
cobbler's stall
I would wait till he flung you off, and
kneel to you
I had to make my father and mother live
on potatoes
I am not ashamed
I hope I am not too hungry to
discriminate
I cannot say less, and will say no more
I wanted a hero
I do not see it, because I will not see
it
I can pay clever gentlemen for doing
Greek for me
I never saw out of a doll-shop, and
never saw there
I 'm the warming pan, as legitimately I
should be
I detest enthusiasm
I baint done yet
I know that your father has been
hearing tales told of me
I never knew till this morning the
force of No in earnest
I hate sleep: I hate anything that robs
me of my will
I have all the luxuries--enough to
loathe them
I who respect the state of marriage by
refusing
I make a point of never recommending my
own house
I like him, I like him, of course, but
I want to breathe
I am a discordant instrument I do not
readily vibrate
I don't count them against women
(moods)
I 'm a bachelor, and a person--you're
married, and an object
I did, replied Evan. 'I told a lie.'
I never see anything, my dear
I always wait for a thing to happen
first
I'll come as straight as I can
I'm for a rational Deity
I'm in love with everything she wishes!
I've got the habit
Idea is the only vital breath
Ideas in gestation are the dullest
matter you can have
If we are really for Nature, we are not
lawless
If there's no doubt about it, how is it
I have a doubt about it?
If you kneel down, who will decline to
put a foot on you?
If I love you, need you care what
anybody else thinks
If we are to please you rightly, always
allow us to play First
If he had valued you half a grain less,
he might have won you
If the world is hostile we are not to
blame it
If we are robbed, we ask, How came we
by the goods?
If thou wouldst fix remembrance--
thwack!
If I'm struck, I strike back
If only been intellectually a little
flexible in his morality
If you have this creative soul, be the
slave of your creature
If I do not speak of payment
Ignorance roaring behind a mask of
sarcasm
Imagination she has, for a source of
strength in the future days
Immense wealth and native obtuseness
combine to disfigure us
Imparting the usual chorus of yesses to
his own mind
Impossible for him to think that women
thought
Impossible for us women to comprehend
love without folly in man
Impudent boy's fling at superiority
over the superior
In the pay of our doctors
In every difficulty, patience is a
life-belt
In India they sacrifice the widows, in
France the virgins
In bottle if not on draught (oratory)
In our House, my son, there is peculiar
blood. We go to wreck!
In Sir Austin's Note-book was written:
"Between Simple Boyhood..."
In Italy, a husband away, ze friend
takes title
In truth she sighed to feel as he did,
above everybody
Incapable of putting the screw upon
weak excited nature
Incessantly speaking of the necessity
we granted it unknowingly
Inclined to act hesitation in accepting
the aid she sought
Increase of dissatisfaction with the
more she got
Indirect communication with heaven
Inducement to act the hypocrite before
the hypocrite world
Indulged in their privilege of thinking
what they liked
Infallibility of our august mother
Infants are said to have their ideas,
and why not young ladies?
Infatuated men argue likewise, and
scandal does not move them
Inferences are like shadows on the wall
Inflicted no foretaste of her coming
subjection to him
Informed him that he never played jokes
with money, or on men
Injury forbids us to be friends again
Innocence and uncleanness may go
together
Insistency upon there being two sides
to a case--to every case
Intellectual contempt of easy dupes
Intensely communicative, but
inarticulate
Intentions are really rich possessions
Intimations of cowardice menacing a
paralysis of the will
Intrusion of the spontaneous on the
stereotyped would clash
Intrusion of hard material statements,
facts
Invite indecision to exhaust their
scruples
Ireland 's the sore place of England
Irishman there is a barrow trolling a
load of grievances
Irishmen will never be quite sincere
Ironical fortitude
Irony in him is only eulogy standing on
its head
Irony that seemed to spring from
aversion
Irony instead of eloquence
Irony provoked his laughter more than
fun
Irritability at the intrusion of past
disputes
Is he jealous? 'Only when I make him,
he is.'
Is not one month of brightness as much
as we can ask for?
Is it any waste of time to write of
love?
It 's us hard ones that get on best in
the world
It was harder to be near and not close
It is not high flying, which usually
ends in heavy falling
It is no insignificant contest when
love has to crush self-love
It would be hard! ay, then we do it
forthwith
It was as if she had been eyeing a
golden door shut fast
It is the best of signs when women take
to her
It was his ill luck to have strong
appetites and a weak stomach
It rarely astonishes our ears It
illumines our souls
It goes at the lifting of the
bridegroom's little finger
It was an honest buss, but dear at ten
thousand
It is well to learn manners without
having them imposed on us
It was in a time before our joyful era
of universal equality
It is the devil's masterstroke to get
us to accuse him
It was her prayer to heaven that she
might save a doctor's bill
It is better for us both, of course
It was now, as Sir Austin had written
it down, The Magnetic Age
It is no use trying to conceal anything
from him
It's a fool that hopes for peace
anywhere
It's no use trying to be a gentleman if
you can't pay for it
Italians were like women, and wanted--a
real beating
Its glee at a catastrophe; its poor
stock of mercy
January was watering and freezing old
earth by turns
Judging of the destiny of man by the
fate of individuals
Just bad inquirin' too close among men
Keep passion sober, a trotter in
harness
Kelts, as they are called, can't and
won't forgive injuries
Kindness is kindness, all over the
world
Knew my friend to be one of the most
absent-minded of men
Lack of precise words admonished him of
the virtue of silence
Land and beasts! They sound like
blessed things
Lawyers hold the keys of the great
world
Lay no petty traps for opportunity
Laying of ghosts is a public duty
Leader accustomed to count ahead upon
vapourish abstractions
Learn all about them afterwards, ay,
and make the best of them
Learn--principally not to be afraid of
ideas
Led him to impress his unchangeableness
upon her
Lend him your own generosity
Lengthened term of peace bred maggots
in the heads of the people
Lest thou commence to lie--be dumb!
Let but the throb be kept for others--
That is the one secret
Let never Necessity draw the bow of our
weakness
Let none of us be so exalted above the
wit of daily life
Levelling a finger at the taxpayer
Lies are usurers' coin we pay for ten
thousand per cent
Life is the burlesque of young dreams
Like a woman, who would and would not,
and wanted a master
Like an ill-reared fruit, first at the
core it rotteth
Limit was two bottles of port wine at a
sitting
Listened to one another, and blinded
the world
Literature is a good stick and a bad
horse
Little boy named Tommy Wedger said he
saw a dead body go by
Littlenesses of which women are accused
Loathing of artifice to raise emotion
Loathing for speculation
Longing for love and dependence
Look within, and avoid lying
Look well behind
Look backward only to correct an error
of conduct in future
Looked as proud as if he had just
clapped down the full amount
Looking on him was listening
Loudness of the interrogation precluded
thought of an answer
Love, with his accustomed cunning
Love the poor devil
Love dies like natural decay
Love the children of Erin, when not
fretted by them
Love of men and women as a toy that I
have played with
Love of pleasure keeps us blind
children
Love and war have been compared--Both
require strategy
Love that shrieks at a mortal wound,
and bleeds humanly
Love discerns unerringly what is and
what is not duty
Love must needs be an egoism
Love is a contagious disease
Love the difficulty better than the
woman
Love, that has risen above emotion,
quite independent of craving
Love's a selfish business one has work
in hand
Loves his poets, can almost understand
what poetry means
Loving in this land: they all go mad,
straight off
Lucky accidents are anticipated only by
fools
Made of his creed a strait-jacket for
humanity
Madness that sane men enamoured can be
struck by
Magnificent in generosity; he had
little humaneness
Magnify an offence in the ratio of our
vanity
Make no effort to amuse him. He is
always occupied
Make a girl drink her tears, if they
ain't to be let fall
Making too much of it--a trick of the
vulgar
Man with a material object in aim, is
the man of his object
Man who beats his wife my first
question is, 'Do he take his tea?'
Man owes a duty to his class
Man who helps me to read the world and
men as they are
Man without a penny in his pocket, and
a gizzard full of pride
Mankind is offended by heterodoxy in
mean attire
Mare would do, and better than a dozen
horses
Mark of a fool to take everybody for a
bigger fool than himself
Marriage is an awful thing, where
there's no love
Married at forty, and I had to take her
shaped as she was
Married a wealthy manufacturer--
bartered her blood for his money
Martyrs of love or religion are madmen
Material good reverses its benefits the
more nearly we clasp it
Matter that is not nourishing to brains
Maxims of her own on the subject of
rising and getting the worm
May lull themselves with their
wakefulness
May not one love, not craving to be
beloved?
Meant to vanquish her with the
dominating patience
Meditations upon the errors of the
general man, as a cover
Memory inspired by the sensations
Men overweeningly in love with their
creations
Men do not play truant from home at
sixty years of age
Men they regard as their natural prey
Men bore the blame, though the women
were rightly punished
Men must fight: the law is only a
quieter field for them
Men in love are children with their
mistresses
Men love to boast of things nobody else
has seen
Men who believe that there is a virtue
in imprecations
Men had not pleased him of late
Mental and moral neuters
Metaphysician's treatise on Nature: a
torch to see the sunrise
Mighty Highnesses who had only smelt
the outside edge of battle
Mika! you did it in cold blood?
Mindless, he says, and arrogant
Minutes taken up by the grey puffs from
their mouths
Mistake of the world is to think
happiness possible to the sense
Mistaking of her desires for her
reasons
Modest are the most easily intoxicated
when they sip at vanity
Money is of course a rough test of
virtue
Money's a chain-cable for holding men
to their senses
Moral indignation is ever consolatory
Morales, madame, suit ze sun
More argument I cannot bear
More culpable the sparer than the
spared
Most youths are like Pope's women; they
have no character
Mrs. Fleming, of Queen Anne's Farm, was
the wife of a yeoman
Music was resumed to confuse the
hearing of the eavesdroppers
Music in Italy? Amorous and martial,
brainless and monotonous
Must be the moralist in the satirist if
satire is to strike
Mutual deference
My engagement to Mr. Pericles is that I
am not to write
My mistress! My glorious stolen fruit!
My dark angel of love
My plain story is of two Kentish
damsels
My first girl--she's brought disgrace
on this house
My belief is, you do it on purpose.
Can't be such rank idiots
My voice! I have my voice! Emilia had
cried it out to herself
Naked original ideas, are acceptable at
no time
Napoleon's treatment of women is
excellent example
Nation's half made-up of the idle and
the servants of the idle
Nations at war are wild beasts
Naturally as deceived as he wished to
be
Nature and Law never agreed
Nature is not of necessity always
roaring
Nature could at a push be eloquent to
defend the guilty
Nature's logic, Nature's voice, for
self-defence
Naughtily Australian and kangarooly
Necessary for him to denounce somebody
Necessity's offspring
Needed support of facts, and feared
them
Never reckon on womankind for a wise
act
Never, never love a married woman
Never intended that we should play with
flesh and blood
Never forget that old Ireland is
weeping
Never forgave an injury without a
return blow for it
Never to despise the good opinion of
the nonentities
Never nurse an injury, great or small
Never was a word fitter for a quack's
mouth than "humanity"
Never fell far short of outstripping
the sturdy pedestrian Time
Never pretend to know a girl by her
face
Nevertheless, inclinations are an
infidelity
Next door to the Last Trump
Night has little mercy for the
self-reproachful
No nose to the hero, no moral to the
tale
No runner can outstrip his fate
No companionship save with the wound
they nurse
No Act to compel a man to deny what
appears in the papers
No great harm done when you're silent
No heart to dare is no heart to love!
No stopping the Press while the people
have an appetite for it
No word is more lightly spoken than
shame
No flattery for me at the expense of my
sisters
No man has a firm foothold who pretends
to it
No enemy's shot is equal to a weak
heart in the act
No man can hear the words which prove
him a prophet (quietly)
No conversation coming of it, her
curiosity was violent
No intoxication of hot blood to cheer
those who sat at home
No case is hopeless till a man consents
to think it is
No love can be without jealousy
No! Gentlemen don't fling stones; leave
that to the blackguards
None but fanatics, cowards,
white-eyeballed dogmatists
Nor can a protest against coarseness be
sweepingly interpreted
Not every chapter can be sunshine
Not afford to lose, and a disposition
free of the craving to win
Not men of brains, but the men of
aptitudes
Not the indignant and the frozen, but
the genially indifferent
Not daring risk of office by offending
the taxpayer
Not in love--She was only not unwilling
to be in love
Not a page of his books reveals
malevolence or a sneer
Not always the right thing to do the
right thing
Not to do things wholly is worse than
not to do things at all
Not to be feared more than are the
general race of bunglers
Not much esteem for non-professional
actresses
Not in a situation that could bear of
her blaming herself
Not so much read a print as read the
imprinting on themselves
Not to go hunting and fawning for
alliances
Not to bother your wits, but leave the
puzzle to the priest
Not to be the idol, to have an aim of
our own
Not the great creatures we assume
ourselves to be
Not likely to be far behind curates in
besieging an heiress
Nothing is a secret that has been
spoken
Nothing desirable will you have which
is not coveted
Nothing the body suffers that the soul
may not profit by
Notoriously been above the honours of
grammar
Nought credit but what outward orbs
reveal
Now far from him under the failure of
an effort to come near
Nursing of a military invalid awakens
tenderer anxieties
O for yesterday!
O self! self! self!
O heaven! of what avail is human
effort?
Obedience oils necessity
Obeseness is the most sensitive of our
ailments
Objects elevated even by a decayed
world have their magnetism
Observation is the most, enduring of
the pleasures of life
Occasional instalments--just to freshen
the account
Official wrath at sound of footfall or
a fancied one
Oggler's genial piety made him shrink
with nausea
Oh! beastly bathos
Oh! I can't bear that class of people
Old houses are doomed to burnings
Old age is a prison wall between us and
young people
Omnipotence, which is in the image of
themselves
On a morning when day and night were
made one by fog
On the threshold of Puberty, there is
one Unselfish Hour
On which does the eye linger longest--
which draws the heart?
On a wild April morning
Once my love? said he. Not now?--does
it mean, not now?
Once out of the rutted line, you are
food for lion and jackal
Once called her beautiful; his praise
had given her beauty
One wants a little animation in a
husband
One who studies is not being a fool
One is a fish to her hook; another a
moth to her light
One might build up a respectable figure
in negatives
One in a temper at a time I'm sure 's
enough
One night, and her character's gone
One learns to have compassion for
fools, by studying them
One has to feel strong in a delicate
position
One of those men whose characters are
read off at a glance
One seed of a piece of folly will lurk
and sprout to confound us
One idea is a bullet
One fool makes many, and so, no doubt,
does one goose
Only to be described in the tongue of
auctioneers
Only true race, properly so called, out
of India--German
Opened a wider view of the world to
him, and a colder
Openly treated; all had an air of being
on the surface
Optional marriages, broken or renewed
every seven years
Or where you will, so that's in Ireland
Oratory will not work against the
stream, or on languid tides
Orderliness, from which men are
privately exempt
Our most diligent pupil learns not so
much as an earnest teacher
Our weakness is the swiftest dog to
hunt us
Our partner is our master
Our comedies are frequently youth's
tragedies
Our life is but a little holding, lent
To do a mighty labour
Our bravest, our best, have an impulse
to run
Our lawyers have us inside out, like
our physicians
Our love and labour are constantly on
trial
Owner of such a woman, and to lose her!
Pact between cowardice and comfort
under the title of expediency
Pain is a cloak that wraps you about
Paint themselves pure white, to the
obliteration of minor spots
Parliament, is the best of occupations
for idle men
Partake of a morning draught
Passion, he says, is noble strength on
fire
Passion is not invariably love
Passion added to a bowl of reason makes
a sophist's mess
Passion does not inspire dark appetite--
Dainty innocence does
Past, future, and present, the three
weights upon humanity
Past fairness, vaguely like a snow
landscape in the thaw
Patience is the pestilence
Patronizing woman
Paying compliments and spoiling a game!
Payment is no more so than to restore
money held in trust
Peace-party which opposed was the
actual cause of the war
Peace, I do pray, for the
husband-haunted wife
Pebble may roll where it likes--not so
the costly jewel
Peculiar subdued form of laughter
through the nose
People of a provocative prosperity