The collection / 96 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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01Undated

People may flatter themselves just as much by thinking that their faults are always present to other people's minds, as if they believe that the world is always contemplating their individual charms and virtues.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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02Undated

He were found drowned. He were coming home very hopeless o' aught on earth. He thought God could na be harder than men; mappen not so hard; mappen as tender as a mother; mappen tenderer. I'm not saying he did right, and I'm not saying he didn't wrong. All I say is, may neither me nor mine ever have his sore heart, or we may do like things.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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03Undated

Indeed! I am truly glad to hear it. I always always fond of Osborne; and, do you know, I never really took to Roger; I respected him and all that, of course. But to compare him with Mr. Henderson! Mr. Henderson is so handsome and well-bred, and gets all his gloves from Houbigant!

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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04Undated

How easy it is to judge rightly after one sees what evil comes from judging wrongly.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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05Undated

I know you despise me; allow me to say, it is because you do not understand me.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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06Undated

There is nothing like wounded affection for giving poignancy to anger.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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07Undated

But Mr. Hale resolved that he would not be disturbed by any such nonsensical idea; so he lay awake, determining not to think about it.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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08Undated

I am the mother that bore you, and your sorrow is my agony; and if you don't hate her, i do'Then, mother, you make me love her more. She is unjustly treated by you, and I must make the balance even.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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09Undated

Jemima was not pretty, the flatness and shortness of her face made her almost plain; yet most people looked twice at her expressive countenance, at the eyes which flamed or melted at every trifle, at the rich colour which came at every expressed emotion into her usually sallow face, at the faultless teeth which made her smile like a sunbeam.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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10Undated

Now, the error which many parents commit in the treatment of the individual at this time(adolescense) is, insisting on the same unreasoning obedience as when all he had to do in the way of duty was, to obey the simple laws of "Come when you're called," and "Do as you're bid!" But a wise parent humours the desire for independent action, so as to become the friend and adviser when his absolute rule shall cease.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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11Undated

Many a one has been comforted in their sorrow by seeing a good dish come upon the table.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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12Undated

Mr. Thorton love Margaret! Why, Margraret would never think of him, I'm sure! Such a thing has never entered her head." "Entering her heart would do.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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13Undated

I believe that this suffering, which Miss Hale says is impressed on the countenances of the people of Milton, is but the natural punishment of dishonestly-enjoyed pleasure, at some former period of their lives. I do not look on self-indulgent, sensual people as worthy of my hatred; I simply look upon them with contempt for their poorness of character.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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14Undated

He had tenderness in his heart — ‘a soft place,’ as Nicholas Higgins called it; but he had some pride in concealing it; he kept it very sacred and safe, and was jealous of every circumstance that tried to gain admission. But if he dreaded exposure of his tenderness, he was equally desirous that all men should recognize his justice; and he felt that he had been unjust, in giving so scornful a hearing to anyone who had waited, with humble patience, for five hours, to speak to him.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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15Undated

She freshens me up above a bit. Who'd ha thought that face - as bright and as strong as the angel I dream of - could have known the sorrow she speaks on? I wonder how she'll sin. All on us must sing.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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16Undated

…everything may be done in a right way or a wrong; the right way is to do it as well as we can, as in God’s sight; the wrong is to do it in a self-seeking spirit, which either leads us to neglect it to follow out some device of our own before and after the doing.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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17Undated

Nature felt no change, and was ever young.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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18Undated

He almost said to himself that he did not like her, before their conversation ended; he tried so hard to compensate himself for the mortified feeling, that while he looked upon her with an admiration he could not repress, she looked at him with proud indifference, taking him, he thought, for what, in his irritation, he told himself - was a great fellow, with not a grace or a refinement about him.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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19Undated

Love me as I am, sweet one, for I shall never be better.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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20Undated

The more it rains and blows, the more certain we are to have him.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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21Undated

If Mr. Thornton was a fool in the morning, as he assured himself at least twenty times he was, he did not grow much wiser in that afternoon. All that he gained in return for his sixpenny omnibus ride, was a more vivid conviction that there never was, never could be, any one like Margaret; that she did not love him and never would; but that she — no! nor the whole world — should never hinder him from loving her.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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22Undated

Margaret liked this smile; it was the first thing she had admired in this new friend of her father's; and the opposition of character, shown in all these details of appearance she had just been noticing, seemed to explain the attraction they evidently felt towards each other.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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23Undated

I daresay it seems foolish; perhaps all our earthly trials will appear foolish to us after a while; perhaps they seem so now to angels. But we are ourselves, you know, and this is now, not some time to come, a long, long way off. And we are not angels, to be comforted by seeing the ends for which everything is sent.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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24Undated

North and South has both met and made kind o' friends in this big smoky place.

Elizabeth Gaskell / quote

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