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Our life is determined for us--and it makes the mind very free when we give up wishing, and only think of bearing what is laid upon us, and doing what is given us to do.

George Eliot

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George Eliot
Age: 61 †
Born: 1819
Born: November 22
Died: 1880
Died: December 22
Editor
Essayist
Journalist
Novelist
Philosopher
Poet
Translator
Writer
Mary Anne Evans
Mary Ann Evans
Marian Evans
Mary Anne Evans Cross
Mary Anne Cross
Given
Wishing
Makes
Bearing
Give
Laid
Giving
Determined
Mind
Fate
Think
Upon
Thinking
Free
Life
Wish

More quotes by George Eliot

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A human life, I think, should be well rooted in some spot of a native land, where it may get the love of tender kinship for the face of earth, for the labors men go forth to, for the sounds and accents that haunt it, for whatever will give that early home a familiar, unmistakable difference amidst the future widening of knowledge.
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How could a man be satisfied with a decision between such alternatives and under such circumstances No more than he can be satisfied with his hat, which he's chosen from among such shapes as the resources of the age offer him. . . .
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When gratitude has become a matter of reasoning there are many ways of escaping from its bonds.
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Miserliness is a capital quality to run in families it's the safe side for madness to dip on.
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It is a wonderful subduer-this need of love, this hunger of the heart.
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In poor Rosamond's mind there was not room enough for luxuries to look small in.
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It's them as take advantage that get advantage I' this world, I think: folks have to wait long enough afore it's brought to 'em.
George Eliot
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The thing we look forward to often comes to pass, but never precisely in the way we have imagined to ourselves.
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What are a handful of reasonable men against a crowd with stones in their hands?
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This is a puzzling world, and Old Harry's got a finger in it.
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Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but to pour them all out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, knowing that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then, with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away.
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Of a truth, Knowledge is power, but it is a power reined by scruple, having a conscience of what must be and what may be whereas Ignorance is a blind giant who, let him but wax unbound, would make it a sport to seize the pillars that hold up the long-wrought fabric of human good, and turn all the places of joy as dark as a buried Babylon.
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Don't seem to he on the lookout for crows, else you'll set other people watching.
George Eliot
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I have nothing to tell except travellers' stories, which are always tiresome, like the description of a play which was very exciting to those who saw it.
George Eliot
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Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest.
George Eliot
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There are few of us that are not rather ashamed of our sins and follies as we look out on the blessed morning sunlight, which comes to us like a bright-winged angel beckoning us to quit the old path of vanity that stretches its dreary length behind us.
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I don't feel sure about doing good in any way now everything seems like going on a mission to a people whose language I don't know.
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... as usual I am suffering much from doubt as to the worth of what I am doing and fear lest I may not be able to complete it so as to make it a contribution to literature and not a mere addition to the heap of books.
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Our virtues are dearer to us the more we have had to suffer for them. It is the same with our children. All profound affection entertains a sacrifice. Our thoughts are often worse than we are, just as they are often better.
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I can't bear fishing. I think people look like fools sitting watching a line hour after hour-or else throwing and throwing, and catching nothing.
George Eliot