1. “There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor.”
2. “A wonderful fact to reflect upon is that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.”
3. “What greater gift than the love of a cat.”
4. “It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”
5. “Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts.”
6. “You have been the last dream of my soul.”
7. “I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.”
8. “There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts.”
9. “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.”
10. “And O, there are days in this life worth life and worth death.”
11. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”
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12. “Be natural, my children, for the writer that is natural has fulfilled all the rules of art.”
13. “Women can always put things in the fewest words. Except when it’s blowing up, and then they lengthen it out.”
14. “I care for no man on earth, and no man on earth cares for me.”
15. “I have had unformed ideas of striving afresh, beginning anew, shaking off sloth and sensuality, and fighting out the abandoned fight.”
16. “Electric communication will never be a substitute for the face of someone who with their soul another person to be brave and true.”
17. “Do the wise thing and the kind thing too, and make the best of us and not the worst.”
18. “Cheerfulness and contentment are great beautifiers, and are famous preservers of good looks.”
19. “You touch on some of the reasons for my going, not for my staying away.”
20. “In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong.”
21. “Every traveler has a home of his own, and he learns to appreciate it the more from his wandering.”
22. “Reflect upon your present blessings—of which every man has many—not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.”
23. “Love her, love her, love her! If she favours you, love her. If she wounds you, love her. If she tears your heart to pieces, and as it gets older and stronger, it will tear deeper, love her, love her, love her!”
24. “Procrastination is the thief of time, collar him.”
25. “You think you will die, but you just keep living, day after day after terrible day.”
26. “My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest.”
27. “It was one of those when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold—when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.”
28. “Estella, to the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my character, part of the little good in me, part of the evil.”
29. “You are part of my existence, part of myself.”
30. “Ask no questions, and you’ll be told no lies.”
31. “And yet I have had the weakness, and still have the weakness, to wish you to know with what a sudden mastery you kindled me, a heap of ashes that I am, into fire.”
32. “There was a long, hard time when I kept far from me the remembrance of what I had thrown away when I was quite ignorant of its worth.”
33. “You are in every line I have ever read.”
34. “Pause, you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day.”
35. “If they would rather die, they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”
36. “New thoughts and hopes were whirling through my mind, and all the colours of my life were changing.”
37. “In the moonlight which is always sad, as the light of the sun itself is—as the light called human life is—at its coming and it’s going.”
38. “I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing when they, who are so fresh from God, love us.”
39. “He knew enough of the world to know that there is nothing in it better than the faithful service of the heart.”
40. “I hope that real love and truth are stronger in the end than any evil or misfortune in the world.”
41. “Have you ever had the sensation of looking at someone for the first time and ever so quickly, the past and future seem to fuse? Does that not mean something? That we felt so much, so deeply, before even speaking?”
42. “A heart well worth winning, and well won. A heart that, once won, goes through fire and water for the winner, and never changes, and is never daunted.”
43. “A man is lucky if he is the first love of a woman. A woman is lucky if she is the last love of a man.”
44. “There lives at least one being who can never change—one being who would be content to devote his whole existence to your happiness, who lives but in your eyes, who breathes but in your smiles, who bears the heavy burden of life itself only for you.”
45. “A silent look of affection and regard when all other eyes are turned coldly away, the consciousness that we possess the sympathy and affection of one being when all others have deserted us, is a hold, a stay, a comfort, in the deepest affliction, which no wealth could purchase, or power bestow.”
46. “A day wasted on others is not wasted on one’s self.”
47. “No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it to anyone else.”
48. “Love, though said to be afflicted with blindness, is a vigilant watchman.”
49. “Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts.”
50. “True love believes everything, and bears everything, and everything.”
51. “You know what I am going to say. I love you.”
52. “Never close your lips to those whom you have already opened your heart to.”
53. “A loving heart is the truest wisdom.”
54. “Mystery and are not absolutely indispensable to the growth of love, but they are, very often, its powerful auxiliaries.”
55. “Love is in all things a most wonderful teacher.”
56. “What other men may mean when they use that expression, I cannot tell. What I mean is that I am under the influence of some tremendous attraction which I have resisted in vain, and which overmasters me.”
57. “The whole difference between construction and creation is exactly this—that a thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists.”
58. “I loved you madly—in the distasteful work of the day, in the wakeful misery of the night, girded by sordid realities, or wandering through Paradises and Hells of visions into which I rushed, carrying your image in my arms, I loved you madly.”
59. “There can be no disparity in marriage like unsuitability of mind and purpose.”
60. “She was more than human to me. She was a Fairy, a Sylph. I don’t know what she was, anything that no one ever saw, and everything that everybody ever wanted. I was swallowed up in an abyss of love in an instant. There was no pausing on the brink, no looking down, or looking back. I was gone, headlong, before I had the sense to say a word to her.”
61. “You could draw me to fire, you could draw me to water, you could draw me to the gallows, you could draw me to any death, you could draw me to anything I have most avoided, you could draw me to any exposure and disgrace. This and the confusion of my thoughts, so that I am fit for nothing, is what I mean by your being the ruin of me.”
62. “What lawsuits grow out of the graves of rich men, every day; sowing perjury, hatred, and lies among near kindred, where there should be nothing but love!”
63. “Your voice and music are the same to me.”
64. “She better liked to see him free and happy, even than to have him near her, because she loved him better than herself.”
65. “To conceal anything from those to whom I am attached, is not in my nature. I can never close my lips where I have opened my heart.”
66. “Think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you.”
67. “You have no idea what it is to have anybody wonderful fond of you, unless you have been down and rolled upon by the lonely feelings that I have mentioned as having once got the better of me.”
68. “If you will take me for your , Walter, I will love you dearly. If you will let me go with you, Walter, I will go to the world’s end without fear. I can give up nothing for you. I have nothing to resign, and no one to forsake; but all my love and life shall be devoted to you, and with my last breath I will breathe your name to God if I have sense and memory left.”
69. “He was conscious of a thousand odours floating in the air, each one connected with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and cares, long, long, forgotten.”
70. “I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”
71. “Remembrance, like a candle, burns brightest at Christmastime.”
72. “Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childhood days, recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth, and transport the traveler back to his own fireside and quiet home!”
73. “Christmas may not bring a single thing; still, it gives me a song to sing.”
74. “Christmas time! That man must be a misanthrope indeed, in whose breast something like a jovial feeling is not roused—in whose mind some pleasant associations are not awakened – by the recurrence of Christmas.”
75. “The Christmas season reminds us that a demonstration of religion is always much better than a definition of it—especially in front of the kids.”
76. “There seems to be magic in the very name of Christmas.”
77. “Perhaps the best Yuletide decorations are to be wreathed in smiles and wrapped in hugs.”
78. “I have always thought of Christmas time as a good time—a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time.”
79. “The miracle of Christmas is that a baby can be so decisive.”
80. “It is good to be a child sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when it’s mighty founder was a child himself.”
81. “But I am sure that I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round—as the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely.”
82. “The year end brings no greater pleasure than the opportunity to express to you the season’s greetings and good wishes.”
83. “May your holidays and new year be filled with joy.”
84. “Christmas is a time in which, of all times in the year, the memory of every remediable sorrow, wrong, and trouble in the world around us, should be active with us, not less than our own experiences, for all good.”
85. “Time was with most of us, when Christmas Day, encircling all our limited world ring, left nothing out for us to miss or seek; bound together all our home enjoyments, affections, and hopes; grouped everything and everyone around the Christmas fire, and make the little picture shining in our bright young eyes, complete.”
86. “Many Merry Christmases, many Happy New Years. Unbroken friendships, great accumulations of cheerful recollections and affections on earth, and heaven for us all.”
87. “Christmas was close at hand, in all his bluff and hearty honesty; it was the season of hospitality, merriment, and open-heartedness; the old year was preparing, like an ancient philosopher, to call his friends around him, and amidst the sound of feasting and revelry to pass gently and calmly away.”
88. “And it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!”
89. “A Merry Christmas to everybody! Happy New Year to all the world!”
90. “He would make a lovely corpse.”
91. “Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be.”
92. “Keep out of Chancery. It’s being ground to bits in a slow mill; it’s being roasted at a slow fire; it’s being stung to death by single bees; it’s being drowned by drops; it’s going mad by grains.”
93. “I have been bent and broken, but I hope, into better shape.”
94. “To close the eyes and give a seeming comfort to the apparel of the dead, is poverty’s holiest touch of nature.”
95. “Death is a mighty, universal truth.”
96. “Joy and grief were mingled in the cup, but there were no bitter tears—for even grief arose so softened, and clothed in such sweet and tender recollections, that it became a solemn pleasure, and lost all character of pain.”
97. “Loves and Cupids took to flight, afraid, and Martyrdom had no such torment in its painted history of suffering.”
98. “The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again.”
99. “We must meet reverses boldly and not suffer them to frighten us, my dear. We must learn to act the play out. We must live with misfortune down, Trot!”
100. “When death strikes down the innocent and young, for every fragile form from which he lets the panting spirit free, a hundred virtues rise, in shapes of mercy, charity, and love, to walk the world and bless it.”
101. “Strong mental agitation and disturbance was no novelty to him, even before his late sufferings. It never is, to obstinate and sullen natures; for they struggle hard to be such.”
102. “Of every tear that sorrowing mortals shed on such green graves, some good is born, some gentler nature comes.”
103. “A father, sister, and were gained and lost, in that one moment.”
104. “There are only two styles of portrait painting—the serious and the smirk.”
105. “Should possibilities be worse to bear than certainties?”
106. “The clouds were drifting over the moon at their giddiest speed, at one time wholly obscuring her, at another, suffering her to burst forth in full splendor and shed her light on all the objects around; anon, driving over her again, with increased velocity, and shrouding everything in darkness.”
107. “There is no vengeance and no infliction of suffering in His life, I am sure. There can be no confusion in following Him, and seeking for no other footsteps, I am certain!”
108. “I was better after I had cried than before—more sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more gentle.”
109. “Let the tears which fell, and the broken words which were exchanged in the long, close embrace between the orphans, be sacred.”
110. “There is the wisdom of the head, and there is the wisdom of the heart.”
111. “No space of can make amends for one life’s opportunity misused.”
112. “So, throughout life, our worst weaknesses and meannesses are usually committed for the sake of the people whom we most despise.”
113. “Spring is the time of year when it is summer in the sun and winter in the shade.”
114. “No one who can read, ever looks at a book—even unopened on a shelf—like one who cannot.”
115. “A dream—all a dream—that ends in nothing and leaves the sleeper where he lay down, but I wish you to know that you inspired it.”
116. “There is prodigious strength in sorrow and despair.”
117. “A multitude of people and yet a solitude.”
118. “I stole her heart away and put ice in its place.”
119. “It is because I think so much of warm and sensitive hearts, that I would spare them from being wounded.”
120. “Family not only needs to consist of merely those whom we share blood, but also for those whom we’d give blood.”
121. “I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.”
122. “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.”
123. “I am what you designed me to be. I am your blade. You cannot now complain if you also feel hurt.”
124. “Happiness is a gift and the trick is not to expect it, but to delight in it when it comes.”
125. “My advice is, never do tomorrow what you can do today.”
126. “I looked at the stars, and considered how awful it would be for a man to turn his face up to them as he froze to death, and see no help or pity in all the glittering multitude.”
127. “Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There’s no better rule.”
128. “The most important thing in life is to stop saying, ‘I wish,’ and start saying ‘I will.’ Consider nothing impossible, then treat possibilities as probabilities.”
129. “Break their hearts, my pride and hope. Break their hearts and have no mercy.”
130. “Not knowing how he lost himself, or how he recovered himself, he may never feel certain of not losing himself again.”
131. “Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures, hover about a lighted candle. Can the candle help it?”
132. “Annual income of twenty pounds, and annual expenditure of twenty pounds and six, ought to result in misery.”
133. “In the little world in which children have their existence, whosoever brings them up, there is nothing so finely perceived and so finely felt as injustice.”
134. “We changed again, and yet again, and it was now too late and too far to go back, and I went on. And the mists had all solemnly risen now, and the world lay spread before me.”
135. “Life is made of so many partings welded together.”
136. “Vengeance and retribution require a long time; it is the rule.”
137. “And I am bored to death with it—bored to death with this place, bored to death with my life, bored to death with myself.”
138. “In a utilitarian age, of all other times, it is a matter of grave importance that fairy tales should be respected.”
139. “There can be no disparity in marriage like unsuitability of mind and purpose.”
140. “No varnish can hide the grain of the wood; and that the more varnish you put on, the more the grain will express itself.”
141. “Liberty, equality, fraternity, or death—the last, much the easiest to bestow, O Guillotine!”
142. “The sun—the bright sun that brings back, not light alone, but new life and hope, and freshness to man—bursts upon the crowded city in clear and radiant glory.”
143. “Trifles make the sum of life.”
144. “Give me a moment, because I like to cry for joy. It’s so delicious, John dear, to cry for joy.”
145. “Crush humanity out of shape once more, under similar hammers, and it will twist itself into the same tortured forms. Sow the same seeds of rapacious licence and oppression over again, and it will surely yield the same fruit according to its kind.”
146. “Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business. Charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”
147. “And a beautiful world we live in, when it is possible, and when many other such things are possible, and not only possible, but done under that there, every day.”
148. “Nothing that we do, is done in vain. I believe, with all my soul, that we shall see triumph.”
149. “It’s in vain to recall the past, unless it works some influence upon the present.”
150. “Some people are nobody’s enemies but their own.”
151. “There were two classes of charitable people—one, the people who did a little and made a great deal of noise; the other, the people who did a great deal and made no noise at all.”
152. “Although a skillful flatterer is a most delightful companion, if you have him all to yourself, his taste becomes very doubtful when he takes to complimenting other people.”
153. “We forge the chains we wear in life.”
154. “I only ask to be free—the butterflies are free.”
155. “The cloud of caring for nothing, which overshadowed him with such a fatal darkness, was very rarely pierced by the light within him.”
156. “I know enough of the world now to have almost lost the capacity of being much surprised by anything.”
157. “Dreams are the bright creatures of poem and legend, who sport on earth in the night season, and melt away in the first beam of the sun, which lights grim care and stern reality on their daily pilgrimage through the world.”