9 quotes
I have lived to thank God that all my prayers have not been answered.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
Our own faces, seen suddenly, will sometimes tell us things concerning ourselves that we did not suspect before.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
[O]ne must have a certain amount of both intelligence and knowledge to be amazed even at the most extraordinary things.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
[W]e wish for more in life, rather than for more of it.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
I do not know why a girl should be expected to talk well till she is at least twenty. There cannot be much in her, she may be prettily exacting, or charmingly modest, but her attractions must be personal, not intellectual.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
[T]his is a woman-ridden age. Yet it is but fair to confess that all the former ones were man-ridden ages. What we want is a happy proportion.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
[U]gliness of the right sort is a kind of beauty. It has some of the best qualities of beauty—it attracts observation and fixes the memory.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
What a bore it is […] that the dull and uneducated and unimaginative should possess a dogged contempt for danger, and a kind of stupid fearlessness that we are never to have. I do not see how a highly imaginative man can have much animal courage.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)
A great many people think of religion as if it was a game that they had to play with an August Opponent—a game at which both could not win, and yet they actually think they can play it unfairly. They want to cheat. But in that grand and awful game, it cannot be said that either wins unless both do.
Off the Skelligs: A Novel (1872)