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"Then idiots talk....of Energy. If there is a word in the dictionary under any letter from A to Z that I abominate, it is energy. It is such a conventional superstition, such parrot gabble! What the deuce!....But show me a good opportunity, show me something really worth being energetic about, and I'll show you energy."
"His gaze wandered from the windows to the stars, as if he would have read in them something that was hidden from him. Many of us would, if we could; but none of us so much as know our letters in the stars yet - or seem likely to do it, in this state of existence - and few languages can be read until their alphabets are mastered."
"The jovial party broke up next morning. Breakings-up are capital things in our school-days, but in after life they are painful enough. Death, self-interest, and fortune's changes, are every day breaking up many a happy group, and scattering them far and wide; and the boys and girls never come back again."
"What is peace? Is it war? No. Is it strife? No. Is it lovely, and gentle, and beautiful, and pleasant, and serene, and joyful? O yes!"
"Nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the onset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have a malady in the less attractive forms."
"Little Red Riding Hood was my first love. I felt that if I could have married Little Red Riding Hood, I should have known perfect bliss."
"Accidents will occur in the best regulated families."
""It wasn't the wine," murmured Mr. Snodgrass, in a broken voice. "It was the salmon.""
"Their demeanor is invariably morose, sullen, clownish and repulsive. I should think there is not, on the face of the earth, a people so entirely destitute of humor, vivacity, or the capacity for enjoyment."
"And I am quite serious when I say that I do not believe there are, on the whole earth besides, so many intensified bores as in these United States."
"Accidents will occur in the best-regulated families; and in families not regulated by that pervading influence which sanctifies while it enhances... in short, by the influence of Woman, in the lofty character of Wife, they may be expected with confidence, and must be borne with philosophy."
"If the law supposes that,' said Mr Bumble...' the law is an ass - an idiot."
"As the gloom and shadow thickened behind him, in that place where it had been gathering so darkly, it took, by slow degrees, - or out of it there came, by some unreal, unsubstantial process - not to be traced by any human sense, - an awful likeness of himself!"
"In a utilitarian age, of all other times, it is a matter of grave importance that fairy tales should be respected."
"The privileges of the side-table included the small prerogatives of sitting next to the toast, and taking two cups of tea to other people's one."
"Around and around the house the leaves fall thick, but never fast, for they come circling down with a dead lightness that is sombre and slow."
"In fine weather the old gentelman is almost constantly in the garden; and when it is too wet to go into it, he will look out the window at it, by the hour together. He has always something to do there, and you will see him digging, and sweeping, and cutting, and planting, with manifest delight."
"Now, what I want is, Facts. . . . Facts alone are wanted in life."
"Veels vithin veels, a prison in a prison."
"It was understood that nothing of a tender nature could possibly be confided to old Barley, by reason of his being totally unequal to the consideration of any subject more psychological than gout, rum, and purser's stores."