Welcome to our collection of George Eliot quotes, where the profound wisdom and eloquence of one of the most celebrated Victorian novelists are encapsulated. George Eliot, the pen name for Mary Ann Evans, was a literary giant whose works continue to inspire and resonate with readers around the globe. With her keen insight into human nature, Eliot crafted narratives that delve deep into the complexities of life, love, society, and morality.
Born in 1819, George Eliot’s literary contributions have left an indelible mark on the world of literature. Her novels, including Middlemarch, Silas Marner, and The Mill on the Floss, are not only masterpieces of storytelling but also repositories of timeless wisdom and reflection. Eliot’s prose is imbued with a rare blend of sensitivity and intellectual rigor, offering profound insights into the human condition and the intricacies of relationships, both personal and societal. Her ability to capture the nuances of human experience with such clarity and empathy continues to captivate readers across generations.
Below, you will find a selection of George Eliot quotes that capture the essence of her profound observations and thought-provoking reflections on life, love, morality, and the human experience.
Harold, like the rest of us, had many impressions which saved him the trouble of distinct ideas. George Eliot
Knowledge slowly builds up what Ignorance in an hour pulls down. George Eliot
Breed is stronger than pasture. George Eliot
Opposition may become sweet to a man when he has christened it persecution. George Eliot
The reward of one duty is the power to fulfill another. George Eliot
The happiest women, like the happiest nations, have no history. George Eliot
There are many victories worse than a defeat. George Eliot
The sons of Judah have to choose that God may again choose them. The divine principle of our race is action, choice, resolved memory. George Eliot
It will never rain roses: when we want to have more roses we must plant more trees. George Eliot
The important work of moving the world forward does not wait to be done by perfect men. George Eliot
There is a great deal of unmapped country within us which would have to be taken into account in an explanation of our gusts and storms. George Eliot
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. George Eliot
Vanity is as ill at ease under indifference as tenderness is under a love which it cannot return. George Eliot
Belief consists in accepting the affirmations of the soul; unbelief, in denying them. George Eliot
What makes life dreary is the want of a motive. George Eliot
I’m not denyin’ the women are foolish. God Almighty made ’em to match the men. George Eliot
We must find our duties in what comes to us, not in what might have been. George Eliot
Genius at first is little more than a great capacity for receiving discipline. George Eliot
The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone. George Eliot
And when a woman’s will is as strong as the man’s who wants to govern her, half her strength must be concealment. George Eliot
The best augury of a man’s success in his profession is that he thinks it the finest in the world. George Eliot
Acting is nothing more or less than playing. The idea is to humanize life. George Eliot
Consequences are unpitying. George Eliot
Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds. George Eliot
I like not only to be loved, but also to be told I am loved. George Eliot
Our words have wings, but fly not where we would. George Eliot
The years between fifty and seventy are the hardest. You are always being asked to do things, and yet you are not decrepit enough to turn them down. George Eliot
Life began with waking up and loving my mother’s face. George Eliot
To have in general but little feeling, seems to be the only security against feeling too much on any particular occasion. George Eliot
No great deed is done by falterers who ask for certainty. George Eliot
Might, could, would – they are contemptible auxiliaries. George Eliot
Hobbies are apt to run away with us, you know; it doesn’t do to be run away with. We must keep the reins. George Eliot
Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together. George Eliot
Anger and jealousy can no more bear to lose sight of their objects than love. George Eliot
But what we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope. George Eliot
No compliment can be eloquent, except as an expression of indifference. George Eliot
It is never too late to be what you might have been. George Eliot
More helpful than all wisdom is one draught of simple human pity that will not forsake us. George Eliot
A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections. George Eliot
Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest. George Eliot
Iteration, like friction, is likely to generate heat instead of progress. George Eliot
I should like to know what is the proper function of women, if it is not to make reasons for husbands to stay at home, and still stronger reasons for bachelors to go out. George Eliot
You may try but you can never imagine what it is to have a man’s form of genius in you, and to suffer the slavery of being a girl. George Eliot
In the vain laughter of folly wisdom hears half its applause. George Eliot
Science is properly more scrupulous than dogma. Dogma gives a charter to mistake, but the very breath of science is a contest with mistake, and must keep the conscience alive. George Eliot
We long for an affection altogether ignorant of our faults. Heaven has accorded this to us in the uncritical canine attachment. George Eliot
An election is coming. Universal peace is declared, and the foxes have a sincere interest in prolonging the lives of the poultry. George Eliot
There is no private life which has not been determined by a wider public life. George Eliot
In all private quarrels the duller nature is triumphant by reason of dullness. George Eliot
A toddling little girl is a centre of common feeling which makes the most dissimilar people understand each other. George Eliot
I like trying to get pregnant. I’m not so sure about childbirth. George Eliot
He was like a cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow. George Eliot
Blessed is the man, who having nothing to say, abstains from giving wordy evidence of the fact. George Eliot
What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other? George Eliot
An ass may bray a good while before he shakes the stars down. George Eliot
It is a narrow mind which cannot look at a subject from various points of view. George Eliot
A woman’s heart must be of such a size and no larger, else it must be pressed small, like Chinese feet; her happiness is to be made as cakes are, by a fixed recipe. George Eliot
Rome – the city of visible history, where the past of a whole hemisphere seems moving in funeral procession with strange ancestral images and trophies gathered from afar. George Eliot
What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined – to strengthen each other – to be at one with each other in silent unspeakable memories. George Eliot
Excessive literary production is a social offense. George Eliot
Only in the agony of parting do we look into the depths of love. George Eliot
No evil dooms us hopelessly except the evil we love, and desire to continue in, and make no effort to escape from. George Eliot
Falsehood is easy, truth so difficult. George Eliot
Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand. George Eliot
No story is the same to us after a lapse of time; or rather we who read it are no longer the same interpreters. George Eliot
We hand folks over to God’s mercy, and show none ourselves. George Eliot
Little children are still the symbol of the eternal marriage between love and duty. George Eliot
Excellence encourages one about life generally; it shows the spiritual wealth of the world. George Eliot
People who can’t be witty exert themselves to be devout and affectionate. George Eliot
Different taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections. George Eliot
Wear a smile and have friends; wear a scowl and have wrinkles. George Eliot
Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them. George Eliot
Animals are such agreeable friends – they ask no questions; they pass no criticisms. George Eliot
You should read history and look at ostracism, persecution, martyrdom, and that kind of thing. They always happen to the best men, you know. George Eliot
Is it not rather what we expect in men, that they should have numerous strands of experience lying side by side and never compare them with each other? George Eliot
In spite of his practical ability, some of his experience had petrified into maxims and quotations. George Eliot
Ignorant kindness may have the effect of cruelty; but to be angry with it as if it were direct cruelty would be an ignorant unkindness. George Eliot
In every parting there is an image of death. George Eliot
When death comes it is never our tenderness that we repent from, but our severity. George Eliot
Blessed is the influence of one true, loving human soul on another. George Eliot
Quarrel? Nonsense; we have not quarreled. If one is not to get into a rage sometimes, what is the good of being friends? George Eliot
Conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course. George Eliot
The finest language is mostly made up of simple unimposing words. George Eliot
All the learnin’ my father paid for was a bit o’ birch at one end and an alphabet at the other. George Eliot
Every woman is supposed to have the same set of motives, or else to be a monster. George Eliot
I desire no future that will break the ties with the past. George Eliot
All meanings, we know, depend on the key of interpretation. 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. George Eliot
There is only one failure in life possible, and that is not to be true to the best one knows. George Eliot
The intense happiness of our union is derived in a high degree from the perfect freedom with which we each follow and declare our own impressions. George Eliot
Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot out the glory of the world, and leave only a margin by which we see the blot? I know no speck so troublesome as self. George Eliot
There is a sort of jealousy which needs very little fire; it is hardly a passion, but a blight bred in the cloudy, damp despondency of uneasy egoism. George Eliot
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. George Eliot
Failure after long perseverance is much grander than never to have a striving good enough to be called a failure. George Eliot
Whether happiness may come or not, one should try and prepare one’s self to do without it. George Eliot
Perhaps the most delightful friendships are those in which there is much agreement, much disputation, and yet more personal liking. George Eliot
The beginning of an acquaintance whether with persons or things is to get a definite outline of our ignorance. George Eliot
Truth has rough flavours if we bite it through. George Eliot
Adventure is not outside man; it is within. George Eliot
We must not sit still and look for miracles; up and doing, and the Lord will be with thee. Prayer and pains, through faith in Christ Jesus, will do anything. George Eliot
