MihaElla > Recent Status Updates

“We are all of us imaginative in some form or other, for images are the brood of desire; and poor old Featherstone, who laughed much at the way in which others cajoled themselves, did not escape the fellowship of illusion....

“A sensible girl though, in my opinion," said Mr. Trumbull, finishing his ale and starting up with an emphatic adjustment of his waistcoat. "I have observed her when she has been mixing medicine in drops. She minds what she is doing, sir. That is a great point in a woman, and a great point for our friend up-stairs, poor dear old soul.

“You have an interesting work there, I see, Miss Garth," he observed, when Mary re-entered. "It is by the author of 'Waverley': that is Sir Walter Scott. I have bought one of his works myself—a very nice thing, a very superior publication, entitled 'Ivanhoe.'

“At this moment she was as natural as she had ever been when she was five years old: she felt that her tears had risen, and it was no use to try to do anything else than let them stay like water on a blue flower or let them fall over her cheeks, even as they would.

“There are many wonderful mixtures in the world which are all alike called love, and claim the privileges of a sublime rage which is an apology for everything (in literature and the drama). Happily Rosamond did not think of committing any desperate act: she plaited her fair hair as beautifully as usual, and kept herself proudly calm.

“You would not give your heart to a man without a decided prospect, I trust, my dear. And think of the two excellent offers I know of that you have refused!—and one still within your reach, if you will not throw it away. I knew a very great beauty who married badly at last, by doing so.

“Oh, my dear, be more thoughtful; don't despise your neighbors so. Remember you are turned twenty-two now, and you will have no fortune: your father, I am sure, will not be able to spare you anything. Mr. Lydgate is very intellectual and clever; I know there is an attraction in that.

“There was silence for a few moments, while Dorothea sat as if she had been turned to marble, though the life within her was so intense that her mind had never before swept in brief time over an equal range of scenes and motives.”

“the source of the illness was the common error of intellectual men—a too eager and monotonous application: the remedy was, to be satisfied with moderate work, and to seek variety of relaxation.”

Monotonous?? Not yet in the current universe. So, I’m mildly intellectual;)
Moderate?? I think I missed my chance 😂

“It was wicked to let a young girl blindly decide her fate in that way, without any effort to save her. Sir James had long ceased to have any regrets on his own account: his heart was satisfied with his engagement to Celia. But he had a chivalrous nature...

“For my part I am very sorry for him. It is an uneasy lot at best, to be what we call highly taught and yet not to enjoy: to be present at this great spectacle of life and never to be liberated from a small hungry shivering self—never to be fully possessed by the glory we behold,...

“She was glowing from her morning toilet as only healthful youth can glow: there was gem-like brightness on her coiled hair and in her hazel eyes; there was warm red life in her lips; her throat had a breathing whiteness above the differing white of the fur...

I have drank to thy Name Eliza! Everlasting peace & happiness (for my Toast) in the first glass of Wine I have adventured to drink. My friend has left me-& I am alone- like thee in thy solitary Cabin after thy return from a tasteless meal in the round house & like thee I fly to my Journal, to tell thee, I never prized thy friendship so high, or loved thee more-or wish’d so ardently to be a sharer of all the weights..

After a tolerable night, I am able, Eliza, to sit up and hold a discourse with the sweet Picture thou hast left behind thee of thyself, and tell it how much I had dreaded the catastrophe, of never seeing its dear Original more in this world- never did that Look of sweet resignation appear so eloquent as now; it has said more to my heart...

“Young folks may get fond of each other before they know what life is, and they may think it all holiday if they can only get together; but it soon turns into working day, my dear. However, you have more sense than most, and you haven't been kept in cotton-wool: there may be no occasion for me to say this, but a father trembles for his daughter, and you are all by yourself here.”

“But scepticism, as we know, can never be thoroughly applied, else life would come to a standstill: something we must believe in and do, and whatever that something may be called, it is virtually our own judgment, even when it seems like the most slavish reliance on another.”

“he had kept twenty pounds in his own pocket as a sort of seed-corn, which, planted by judgment, and watered by luck, might yield more than threefold—a very poor rate of multiplication when the field is a young gentleman's infinite soul, with all the numerals at command.”

-and now, if I have strength and Spirits to trail my pen down to the bottom of the page, I have as whimsical a Story to tell you, and as comically disastrous as ever befell one of our family – Shandy’s Nose-his name- his Sash-Window are fools to it. It will serve at least to amuse you.

adieu! my sweet Eliza! for this night- thy Yorick is going to waste himself on a restless bed, where he will turn from side to Side a thousand times- and dream by Intervals of things terrible and impossible-That Eliza is false to Yorick, or Yorick is false to Eliza

“To be a poet is to have a soul so quick to discern that no shade of quality escapes it, and so quick to feel, that discernment is but a hand playing with finely ordered variety on the chords of emotion—a soul in which knowledge passes instantaneously into feeling, and feeling flashes back as a new organ of knowledge. One may have that condition by fits only.”

“The best piety is to enjoy—when you can. You are doing the most then to save the earth's character as an agreeable planet. And enjoyment radiates. It is of no use to try and take care of all the world; that is being taken care of when you feel delight—in art or in anything else”

“Dorothea sat down and subsided into calm silence, feeling happier than she had done for a long while before. Every one about her seemed good, and she said to herself that Rome, if she had only been less ignorant, would have been full of beauty its sadness would have been winged with hope.

poor Sick-headed, sick hearted Yorick! Eliza has made a Shadow of thee- I am absolutely good for nothing, as every mortal is who can think and talk but upon one thing!- how I shall rally my powers, alarms me; for Eliza thou has melted them all into one-the power of loving thee-and with such ardent affection as triumphs over all other feelings..

“We are all of us born in moral stupidity, taking the world as an udder to feed our supreme selves: Dorothea had early begun to emerge from that stupidity, but yet it had been easier to her to imagine how she would devote herself to Mr. Casaubon, and become wise and strong in his strength and wisdom,...

Worn out with fevers of all kinds but most, by that fever of the heart with which I’m eternally wasting, and shall waste till I see Eliza again- dreadful Suffering of 15 Months!- it may be more- great Controuler of Events! surely thou wilt proportion this, to my Strength, and to that of my Eliza.

Eliza! -dark to me is all this world without thee! and most heavily will every hour pass over my head, till that is come which brings thee, dear Woman back to Albion.

“But in Dorothea's mind there was a current into which all thought and feeling were apt sooner or later to flow—the reaching forward of the whole consciousness towards the fullest truth, the least partial good. There was clearly something better than anger and despondency.”

“But in Dorothea's mind there was a current into which all thought and feeling were apt sooner or later to flow—the reaching forward of the whole consciousness towards the fullest truth, the least partial good. There was clearly something better than anger and despondency.”

“Dorothea...was sobbing bitterly, with such abandonment to this relief of an oppressed heart as a woman habitually controlled by pride on her own account and thoughtfulness for others will sometimes allow herself when she feels securely alone. And Mr. Casaubon was certain to remain away for some time at the Vatican.”

“At all events, it is certain that if any medical man had come to Middlemarch with the reputation of having very definite religious views, of being given to prayer, and of otherwise showing an active piety, there would have been a general presumption against his medical skill.”