For the tragedy of our lives is not created entirely from within. “Character,” says Novalis, in one of his questionable aphorisms,–“character is destiny.” But not the whole of our destiny.
If any one will here contend that there must have been traits of goodness in old Featherstone, I will not presume to deny this; but I must observe that goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much privacy, elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance. In.
I am telling the history of very simple people, who had never had any illuminating doubts as to personal integrity and honor.
I can look forward to no better happiness than that which would be one with yours.
And there’s such a thing as being oversperitial; we must have something beside Gospel i’ this world. Look at the canals, an’ th’ aqueduc’s, an’ th’ coal-pit engines, and Arkwright’s mills there at Cromford; a man must learn summat beside Gospel to make them things, I reckon. But t’ hear some o’ them preachers, you’d think as a man must be doing nothing all’s life but shutting’s eyes and looking what’s agoing on inside him.
I know the sort,′ said Mr. Hawley, ’some emissary. He’ll begin with flourish about the Rights of Man and end with murdering a wench.
Chiunque osservi con attenzione la convergenza furtiva dei destini umani, scorge una lenta preparazione di effetti che una vita esercita su un’altra, che ha l’effetto di una calcolata ironia sull’indifferenza o sullo sguardo gelido con cui guardiamo il nostro vicino non ancora conosciuto. Il Destino sta in attesa, sarcastico, tenendo i nostri dramatis personae stretti in pugno.
I think there is more than enough literature of the criticizing sort... To read much of it seems to me seriously injurious: it accustoms men and women to formulate opinions instead of receiving deep impressions, and to receive deep impressions is the foundation of all true mental power.
People can easily take the sacred word duty as a name for what they desire any one else to do.
Le nostre passioni non vivono l’una separata dall’altra, in camere serrate a chiave, ma, rivestite del loro modesto guardaroba di idee, portano i loro viveri a un tavolo comune e mangiano assieme, nutrendosi delle provviste comuni a seconda del loro appetito.
She would have been obliged to allow, if any one had said it to her, that what she submitted to could not take the shape of duty, but was submission to a yoke drawn on her by an action she was ashamed of, and worn with a strength of selfish motives that left no weight for duty to carry.
I never could look on it in the light of a recreation to have my ears teased with measured noises,” said Mr Casaubon.
Good God! It is horrible! He is no better than a mummy!
It is a woman’s duty not to lower herself.
My spirit is too weak; mortality Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep, And each imagined pinnacle and steep Of godlike hardship tells me I must die Like a sick eagle looking at the sky.” – Keats After.
She was not coldly clever and indirectly satirical, but adorably simple and full of feeling.
I am perhaps talking rather superfluously; but a man likes to assume superiority over himself, by holding up his bad example and sermonising on it.
There is no more to be said. Things cannot be altered, and who cares? It makes no difference to any one else what we do. We must try not to care ourselves. We must not give way. I dread giving way. Help me to he quiet.
And a man who speaks effectively through music is compelled to something more difficult than parliamentary eloquence.” With.
Pues no podemos haber aquello que queremos, queramos aquello que podremos. Since we cannot get what we like, let us like what we can get. – Spanish Proverb.
A character at unity with itself –that performs what it intends, subdues every counteracting impulse, and has no visions beyond the distinctly possible –is strong by its very negations.