Evan’s Reviews > Middlemarch > Status Update

“It was in her nature to be proud that he was blameless, and through all her feelings there ran this vein—"I was right to defend him."’

“Would he hear of that fact which made her cheeks burn as they never used to do? And how would he feel when he heard it? But she could see as well as possible how he smiled down at the little old maid. An Italian with white mice! On the contrary, he was a creature who entered into everyone's feelings and could take the pressure of their thought instead of urging his own with iron resistance.”

“She blushed and looked at him as the garden flowers look at us when we walk forth happily among them in the transcendent evening light.”

“To ask her to be less simple and direct would be like breathing on the crystal that you want to see the light through.”

“I think we have no right to come forward and urge wider changes for good until we have tried to alter the evils which lie under our own hands."

“Yet she liked her thoughts; a vigorous young mind not overbalanced by passion finds a good in making acquaintance with life and watches its own powers with interest. Mary had plenty of merriment within.”

“Will again feared that he had gone too far, but the meaning we attach to words depends on our feeling, and his tone of angry regret had so much kindness in it for Dorothea's heart, which had always been giving out ardour and had never been fed with much from the living beings around her, that she felt a new sense of gratitude and answered with a gentle smile.”

Part 1/8 complete!

“We mortals, men and women, devour many a disappointment between breakfast and dinnertime, keep back the tears and look a little pale about the lips, and in answer to inquiries say, "Oh, nothing!" Pride helps us, and pride is not a bad thing when it only urges us to hide our own hurts - not to hurt others."