1,913 Quotes by Charles Dickens

That small world, like the great one out of doors, had the capacity of easily forgetting its dead; and when the cook had said she was a quiet-tempered lady, and the housekeeper had said it was the common lot, and the butler had said who'd have thought it, and the housemaid had said she couldn't hardly believe it, and the footman had said it seemed exactly like a dream, they had quite worn the subject out, and began to think their mourning was wearing rusty too.

In any new movement, by definition, the pre-existing relations have to be destroyed and also, by definition, the older generation annoyed (even repulsed). The new generation must be confused. If there is not repulsion and confusion in the face of the new, then either it is not new or the viewer is uncomprehending.

And them and their descendants, to the last of their race, I, Alexandre Manette, unhappy prisoner, do this last night of the year 1767, in my unbearable agony, denounce to the times when all these things shall be answered for. I denounce them to Heaven and to earth.

Beneath that arch of unmoved and eternal lights: some, so remote from this little earth that the learned tell us it is doubtful whether their rays have been yet discovered it, as a point in space where anything is suffered or done: the shadows of the night were broad and black.

Let me persuade you then--oh, do let me persuade you," said the child, "to think no more of gains or losses, and to try no fortune but the fortune we pursue together.

...his philanthropy was of that gunpowderous sort that the difference between it & animosity was hard to determine

You've got the key of the street.

He [Mr. Snagsby] is a mild, bald, timid man with a shining head and a scrubby clump of black hair sticking out at the back. He tends to meekness and obesity.

unless we learn to do our duty to those whom we employ, they will never learn to do their duty to us