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Fidelity to conscience is inconsistent with retiring modesty. If it be so, let the modesty succumb. It can be only a false modesty which can be thus endangered.

— Harriet Martineau

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More quotes by Harriet Martineau

If a test of civilization be sought, none can be so sure as the condition of that half of society over which the other half has power.

What office is there which involves more responsibility, which requires more qualifications, and which ought, therefore, to be more honourable, than that of teaching?

Day-thoughts feed nightly dreams;
And sorrow tracketh wrong,
As echo follows song.

For my own part, I had rather suffer any inconvenience from having to work occasionally in chambers and kitchen … than witness the subservience in which the menial class is held in Europe.

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Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

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Affectation hides three times as many virtues as charity does sins.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Harriet Martineau (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.