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Marriage ... is still the imperfect institution it must remain while women continue to be ill-educated, passive, and subservient.

Harriet Martineau

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Harriet Martineau
Age: 74 †
Born: 1802
Born: June 12
Died: 1876
Died: June 27
Economist
Essayist
Feminist
Historian
Journalist
Linguist
Novelist
Philosopher
Sociologist
Suffragist
Translator
Writer
Norwich
Norfolk
Still
Ill
Must
Educated
Remain
Institutions
Subservient
Continue
Institution
Marriage
Passive
Stills
Inequality
Women
Imperfect

More quotes by Harriet Martineau

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If the national mind of America be judged of by its legislation, it is of a very high order ... If the American nation be judged of by its literature, it may be pronounced to have no mind at all.
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I wrote because I could not help it. There was something that I wanted to say, and I said it: that was all. The fame and the money and the usefulness might or might not follow. It was not by my endeavor if they did.
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It is my deliberate opinion that the one essential requisite of human welfare in all ways is scientific knowledge of human nature.
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There have been few things in my life which have had a more genial effect on my mind than the possession of a piece of land.
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it is the worst humiliation and grievance of the suffering, that they cause suffering.
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Happiness consists in the full employment of our faculties in some pursuit.
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The progression of emancipation of any class usually, if not always, takes place through the efforts of individuals of that class.
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It is characteristic of genius to be hopeful and aspiring.
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Religion is a temper, not a pursuit.
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I never did a right thing or abstained from a wrong one from any consideration of reward or punishment.
Harriet Martineau
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Leisure, some degree of it, is necessary to the health of every man's spirit.
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The sick-room becomes the scene of intense convictions and among these, none, it seems to me, is more distinct and powerful than that of the permanent nature of good, and the transient nature of evil.
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Goodness and simplicity are indissolubly united.-The bad are the most sophisticated, all the world over, and the good the least.
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[I] wish that the land-tax went a little more according to situation than it does. 'Tis really ridiculous, how one has to pay five times as much as another, without any reason that ever I heard tell.
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I certainly had no idea how little faith Christians have in their own faith till I saw how ill their courage and temper can stand any attack on it.
Harriet Martineau
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If there is any country on earth where the course of true love may be expected to run smooth, it is America.
Harriet Martineau
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My business in life has been to think and learn, and to speak out with absolute freedom what I have thought and learned. The freedom is itself a positive and never-failing enjoyment to me, after the bondage of my early life.
Harriet Martineau
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I have suffered, like other writers, from indolence, irresolution, distaste to my work, absence of 'inspiration,' and all that: but I have also found that sitting down, however reluctantly, with the pen in my hand, I have never worked for one quarter of an hour without finding myself in full train.
Harriet Martineau
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Everything but truth becomes loathed in a sick-room ... Let the nurse avow that the medicine is nauseous. Let the physician declare that the treatment will be painful. Let sister, or brother, or friend, tell me that I must never look to be well. When the time approaches that I am to die, let me be told that I am to die, and when.
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Self-denial is taught much better by inspiring the love of our neighbor, than by the prohibition of innocent comforts and pleasures. Spirituality is much better taught by making spiritual things the objects of supreme desire, than by commanding an ostentatious avoidance of the enjoyments of life.
Harriet Martineau