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"He had tenderness in his heart - 'a soft place,' as Nicholas Higgins called it; but he had some pride in concealing it; he kept it very sacred and safe, and was jealous of every circumstance that tried to gain admission. But if he dreaded exposure of his tenderness, he was equally desirous that all men should recognize his justice; and he felt that he had been unjust, in giving so scornful a hearing to anyone who had waited, with humble patience, for five hours, to speak to him."
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"If you know how it's to be treated unfairly, you will be gentle with others."

"Great occasions often stimulate a person to do something great, but that tells nothing of his or her real character. Great is the person who does good always, in sickness and in health, in riches and in poverty."

"Cockiness is a display of an empty lifestyle, humility is when you see yourself as a zero while others are making you their hero."
Explore more quotes by Elizabeth Gaskell

"He shrank from hearing Margaret's very name mentioned; he, while he blamed her ' while he was jealous of her ' while he renounced her ' he loved her sorely, in spite of himself."

"I would far rather have two or three lilies of the valley gathered for me by a person I like, than the most expensive bouquet that could be bought!"

"It seemed as though he gave way all at once; he was so languid that he could not control his thoughts; they would wander to her; they would bring back the scene,- not of his repulse and rejection the day before but the looks, the actions of the day before that. He went along the crowded streets mechanically, winding in and out among the people, but never seeing them, -almost sick with longing for that one half-hour-that one brief space of time when she clung to him, and her heart beat against his-to come once again."

"But suppose it was truth double strong, it were no truth to me if I couldna take it in. I daresay there's truth in yon Latin book on your shelves; but it's gibberish and no truth to me, unless I know the meaning o' the words."

"He were found drowned. He were coming home very hopeless o' aught on earth. He thought God could na be harder than men; mappen not so hard; mappen as tender as a mother; mappen tenderer. I'm not saying he did right, and I'm not saying he didn't wrong. All I say is, may neither me nor mine ever have his sore heart, or we may do like things."

"All the morning since he got up he had been trying to fight through his duties-leaning against a hope-a hope that first had bowed, and then had broke as soon as he really tried its weight. There was not a sign of Sylvia's liking for him to be gathered from the most careful recollection of the past evening. It was of no use thinking there was. It was better to give it up altogether and at once. But what if he could not? What if the thought of her was bound up with his life; and that once torn out by his own free will, the very roots of his heart must come also?"

"I only mean, Bessy, there's good and bad in everything in this world; and as you felt the bad up here, I thought it was but fair you should know the bad down there."

"If she lives, she shall be my wedded wife. If she dies--mother, I can't speak of what I shall feel if she dies.' His voice was choked in his throat."

"Everything may be done in a right way or a wrong; the right way is to do it as well as we can, as in God's sight; the wrong is to do it in a self-seeking spirit, which either leads us to neglect it to follow out some device of our own before and after the doing."
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