George Eliot

Literature English 1819 – 1880 97 quotes

The pen name of Mary Ann Evans, an English novelist, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era.

Quotes by George Eliot

It is a narrow mind which cannot look at a subject from various points of view.

The Mill on the Floss 1860

What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?

Middlemarch 1872

Our lives are not our own, but are given to us to be used for the good of others.

Silas Marner 1861

Don't judge a book by its cover.

The Mill on the Floss 1860

The strongest principle of growth lies in the human choice.

Middlemarch 1872

It seems to me that we can never give up longing and wishing while we are still alive.

Middlemarch 1872

The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels of our destiny stand mute by our side, and we only know their presence when they are gone.

Adam Bede 1859

No great deed is done by falterers who ask for certainty.

Middlemarch 1872

It is a good world, and we are all of us in it.

Silas Marner 1861

Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.

Middlemarch 1872

The reward of one duty is the power to fulfill another.

Middlemarch 1872

We are all of us born in moral stupidity, and the world is obliged to find us in our wit.

Middlemarch 1872

The only failure is not to try.

Middlemarch 1872

It is never too late to be what you might have been.

Middlemarch 1872

Adventure is not outside man; it is within.

Middlemarch 1872

Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.

Middlemarch 1872

The world is an old woman, and she will not be improved.

The Mill on the Floss 1860

Character is not cut in marble; it is not something solid and unalterable. It is something living and changing, and may become diseased as our bodies do.

Middlemarch 1872

If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence.

Middlemarch 1872

The beginning of compunction is the beginning of wisdom.

Middlemarch 1872