We came to the house, and it is an old house, full of great chimneys where wood is burnt on ancient dogs upon the hearth, and grim portraits (some of them with grim legends, too) lower distrustfully from the oaken panels of the walls. ~ A Christmas Tree
Quotes
“How could you give me
“How could you give me life, and take from me all the inappreciable things that raise it from the state of conscious death?” ~ Hard Times
Oh! But he was a
Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. ~ A Christmas Carol
It’s an Old Habit of Mine
“It’s an old habit of mine, Wal’r,” said the Captain, “any time these fifty year. When you see Ned Cuttle bite his nails, Wal’r, then you may know that Ned Cuttle’s aground.” ~ Dombey and Son
“Remember how strong we are
“Remember how strong we are in our happiness, and how weak he is in his misery!” ~ A Tale of Two Cities
But for some trouble and sorrow
“I have read in your face, as plain as if it was a book, that but for some trouble and sorrow we should never know half the good there is about us.” ~ The Haunted Man
There was not one straight
There was not one straight floor from the foundation to the roof; the ceilings were so fantastically clouded by smoke and dust, that old women might have told fortunes in them better than in grouts of tea. ~ Little Dorrit
“I must be taken as
“I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.” ~ Great Expectations
“My little woman, I wondered
“My little woman, I wondered how,” gasped Mr. Tetterby, supporting himself by his chair, “I wondered how I had ever admired you – I forgot the precious children you have brought about me, and thought you didn’t look as slim as I could wish. I – I never gave a recollection,” said Mr. Tetterby, with severe self-accusation, “to the cares you’ve had as my wife, and along of me and mine, when you might have had hardly any with another man, who got on better and was luckier than me (anybody might have found such a man easily I am sure); and I quarrelled with you for having aged a little in the rough years you have lightened for me. Can you believe it, my little woman? I hardly can myself.” ~ The Haunted Man
“Don’t be afraid! We won’t
“Don’t be afraid! We won’t make an author of you, while there’s an honest trade to be learnt, or brick-making to turn to.” ~ Oliver Twist
