Happy Tuesday, book lovers! I had so much fun putting together this week’s Top Ten Tuesday post. The topic this week from That Artsy Reader Girl is Inspirational/Thought-Provoking Book Quotes. One of the reasons I prefer reading eBooks rather than physical books is that I can highlight to my heart’s content. Favourite descriptions, witty one-liners, heart-melting moments, and thought-provoking quotes all get highlighted so that I can come back and revisit them when the fancy strikes. And that comes in super handy for posts like this one!
Each of the quotes I’m sharing today comes from a book I’ve read in the last 12-18 months, and yes, I’m leaning heavily on some classics this week. One of the reasons these books are still so popular today is because they show us something about human nature that transcends time and place, and each of these quotes either struck a resounding “yes!” in me or caused me to stop and ponder and even, on occasion, smile to myself. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed finding them. 🙂
“I sometimes think there’s two sides to the commandment; and that we may say, ‘Let others do unto you, as you would do unto them,’ for pride often prevents our giving others a great deal of pleasure, in not letting them be kind, when their hearts are longing to help; and when we ourselves should wish to do just the same, if we were in their place.”
Margaret Jennings
MARY BARTON by Elizabeth Gaskell
“John Foster says,” quoted Valancy, “‘If you can sit in silence with a person for half an hour and yet be entirely comfortable, you and that person can be friends. If you cannot, friends you’ll never be and you need not waste time in trying.'”
Valancy Stirling
THE BLUE CASTLE by L.M. Montgomery
“My dear Miss Gregory,” said Syme gently, “there are many kinds of sincerity and insincerity. When you say ‘thank you’ for the salt, do you mean what you say? No. When you say ‘the world is round,’ do you mean what you say? No. It is true, but you don’t mean it. Now, sometimes a man like your brother really finds a thing he does mean. It may be only a half-truth, quarter-truth, tenth-truth; but then he says more than he means—from sheer force of meaning it.”
Gabriel Syme
THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY by G.K. Chesterton
Every good man in this world has convictions about right and wrong. They are his soul’s riches, his spiritual gold. When his conduct is at variance with these, he knows that it is a departure, a falling; and this is a simple and clear matter. If falling were all that ever happened to a good man, all his days would be a simple matter of striving and repentance. But it is not all. There come to him certain junctures, crises, when life, like a highwayman, springs upon him, demanding that he stand and deliver his convictions in the name of some righteous cause, bidding him do evil that good may come.
THE VIRGINIAN by Owen Wister
It is a common sentence that Knowledge is power; but who hath duly Considered or set forth the power of Ignorance? Knowledge slowly builds up what Ignorance in an hour pulls down. Knowledge, through patient and frugal centuries, enlarges discovery and makes record of it; Ignorance, wanting its day’s dinner, lights a fire with the record, and gives a flavor to its one roast with the burned souls of many generations. . . . 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 dark as a buried Babylon.
DANIEL DERONDA by George Eliot
Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there anything so real as words?
THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY by Oscar Wilde
“It may be profitable to you to reflect, in future, that there never were greed and cunning in the world yet, that did not do too much, and overreach themselves. It is as certain as death.”
David Copperfield
DAVID COPPERFIELD by Charles Dickens
[I]t may not be amiss for all people who shall meet with my story to make this just observation from it: How frequently, in the course of our lives, the evil which in itself we seek most to shun, and which, when we are fallen into, is the most dreadful to us, is oftentimes the very means or door of our deliverance, by which alone we can be raised again from the affliction we are fallen into.
Robinson Crusoe
ROBINSON CRUSOE by Daniel Defoe
One may be elegant or enthusiastic, but seldom both.
Veronica Speedwell
A CURIOUS BEGINNING by Deanna Raybourn
And the quote that must surely be the raison d’être for shows such as The Bachelor:
[T]o diffuse a certain degree of ill temper throughout a whole assembly of pretty women, the arrival of a prettier woman suffices, especially when there is but one man present.
THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE-DAME by Victor Hugo
These are great! I especially like the one from The Blue Castle, and the Speedwell one made me smile as well. 🙂
Loved reading these. I haven’t read many of these books, so it was nice to get a taster of some of the writing!
I have heard SO many good things about “The Blue Castle,” but alas, I’ve yet to actually read the novel! Hopefully I’ll fix this soon-ish. 😉
Oh, you must! It’s an absolute gem!
Nice to see some quotes from classic books. Thanks for sharing them. My TTT favorite quotes of the year
Some great quotes on your list, too. Thanks for visiting 🙂
❤❤ The Blue Castle made my list, too!
I especially like the quote you shared from The Virginian. Yay for reading classics!
How could we NOT include The Blue Castle? So quotable!
Amanda Stevens put me on to The Virginian. I haven’t read many Westerns, but it was a great read!
I’ve watched the old “The Virginian” TV show since I was a kid! It’s a classic! I didn’t realize it was a book. But now I want to read it!
I like the fact that you included so many classics in your list this week.
Here is our Top Ten Tuesday.
The Blue Castle is my favourite L.M. Montgomery story. It was lovely to see a quote from it in your list.
My TTT.
I love the classic theme you have going on! I think your first quote is my favorite. It’s definitely worth pondering!
I like your quote about ignorance is good. There are way more LM Montgomery books than I realized!
The Blue Castle is a favourite of mine. If you haven’t read it, you really should!
ooo the one from The Virginian really speaks to me!
It’s a good one, isn’t it? The whole book is a great read 🙂
I love that there are a lot of classics on here. A few of these are still on my list to read. I took a bit of a break from the classics to branch out, but I’m itching to get back into them. Here’s my list this week: https://clockworkbibliotheca.blogspot.com/2019/04/ttt-thought-provoking-book-quotes.html