Historical Novels

"[From Curl]: You reason too much ; all young people are so fond of reasons, as if reasons were of any use. … It is your duty to write what will sell, and I tell you reasons are unmarketable commodities."

"[From Curl]: I don't, myself, dislike a fine phrase now and then ; but fine words, like fine clothes, don't do to wear every day : you would soon find yourself without any to wear."

"[From Lady Mary Wortley Montague]: There is candour, at least, in borrowing from the wit of others, it frankly admits that we have none of our own."

"There is nothing in this world so sensitive as affection. It feels its own happiness too much not to tremble for its reality ; and starts, ever and anon, from its own delicious consciousness, to ask, Is it not, indeed, a dream ? A word and a look are enough either to repress or to encourage. Nothing is a trifle in love, for all is seen through an exaggerated medium …"

"Ah! there are memories that will not vanish; Thoughts of the past we have no power to banish."

"[From Lord Norbourne]: I have heard much of the beauty of truth ; but it is a beauty no one likes to look upon. To find it out, is only to find that you have been duped in every possible manner; and to hear it, is only to have a friend give way to his temper, and say something disagreeable to you."

"[From Lord Norbourne]: A woman always exaggerates to herself as she talks. Silence is the first step to forgetfulness."

"After all, there is nothing like business for enabling us to get through our weary existence. The intellect cannot sustain its sunshine flight long ; the flagging wing drops to the earth. Pleasure palls, and idleness is "Many gathered miseries in one name ; " but business gets over the hours without counting them. It may be very tired at the end, still it has brought the day to a close sooner than any thing else."

"All things are symbols ; and we find, In morning's lovely prime, The actual history of the mind In its own early time:"

"Day belongs to the earthlier deities — the stern, the harsh, and the cold. Gnomes are the spirits of daily hours. Toil, thought, and strife, beset us : we have to work, to quarrel, and to struggle : we have to take our neighbours in ; or, at least, to avoid their doing so by us. We are false, designing, and cautious ; for, after all, the doom of Ishmael is the doom of the whole race of men. His hand against every one, and every one's hand against him. Talk of general benevolence and philanthropy — nonsense! We all in our hearts hate each other; and good cause have we for so doing. But night comes in with a more genial spirit : we have done our worst and our bitterest ; and we need a small space to indulge any little bit of cordiality that may be left in us. A thousand gay phantasms float in on the sunny south, which has left the far-off vineyards of its birth. The taverns of our ancestors would ill bear contrasting with the clubs of to-day ; but many a gay midnight was past in the former : — midnights, whose mirth has descended even to us ; half the jests, whose gaiety is still contagious; half the epigrams, whose point is yet felt, were born of those brief and brilliant hours."

"It is curious to note how gradually the flowers warm into the rich colours and aromatic breath of summer. First, comes the snow-drop, formed from the snows, which give it name ; fair, but cold and scentless : then comes the primrose, with its faint soft hues, and its faint soft perfume — an allegory of actual existence, where the tenderest and most fragile natures are often those selected to bear the coldest weather, and the most bleak exposure."

"These are the spiders of society; They weave their petty webs of lies and sneers, And lie themselves in ambush for the spoil, The web seems fair, and glitters in the sun, And the poor victim winds him in the toil Before he dreams of danger or of death."

"… and, alas ! for human nature, envy will always delight in inflicting mortification."

"What would women do, if headachs were abolished? They are the universal feminine resource."

"Why, what a history is on the rose ! A history beyond all other flowers ; But never more, in garden or in grove, Will the white queen reign paramount again. She must content her with remembered things, When her pale leaves were badge for knight and earl ; Pledge of a loyalty which was as pure, As free from stain, as those white depths her leaves Unfolded to the earliest breath of June."

"Mr. Trevanion was one of those talkers, who are too much engrossed with their own subject matter to have much attention to bestow elsewhere ; with them silence is attention. Ethel's wandering eye, and lip, tremulous with its effort to speak, would never have attracted his notice. To his utter astonishment, she interrupted a parenthesis, as brilliant as the rocket which it depicted, by saying, — "Mr. Trevanion, I do not know what you will think of my boldness, but I must speak to you.""

"[From Constance Courtenaye]: I see clearly that society is as much a science as astronomy ; and, also, that, like poetry, one must be born with a genius for it."

"As all of beauty, save her blush, were there; And, like light clouds floating around each room, The censers sent their breathings of perfume; And scented waters mingled with the breath Of flowers that died as they rejoiced in death."

"Faint and more faint amid the world of dreams, That which once my all, thy image seems, Pale as a star that in the morning gleams."

"These are the things that fret away the heart Cold, careless trifles ; but not felt the less For mingling with the hourly acts of life."

"[From Lord Marchmont]: Are you aware that I have, for a week past, been in the opposition ? But I own it is too much to expect that women should understand these matters."

"Love is a thing of frail and delicate growth ; Soon checked, soon fostered ; feeble, and yet strong : It will endure much, suffer long, and bear What would weigh down an angel's wing to earth, And yet mount heavenward ; but not the less It dieth of a word, a look, a thought ; And when it dies, it dies without a sign To tell how fair it was in happier hours ; It leaves behind reproaches and regrets. And bitterness within affection's well, For which there is no healing."

"There is not a more bitter pang than that which accompanies the desire to befriend, and the inability of so doing."

"This is one of the most unpleasant lessons that experience gives; and one, moreover, that it is perpetually giving; namely, that what we fancied was liking for ourselves, was in reality, the result of , calculation, or of amusement. We fancied we were liked, when we were only useful or entertaining."

"[From Lady Mary Wortley Montague]: It is very odd that quarrels, which are so pleasant in love, should be so odious in marriage. I believe it is that, in the first instance, they may have consequences ; in the last, they have none : your lover may fear to lose you ; your husband can only hope, and hope in vain : the lover dreads that every quarrel may be the last; the husband knows he may go on quarrelling to eternity !"

"[From Lady Mary Wortley Montague ]: Lawgivers were never more mistaken than when they ordained that the conjugal tie should last through life for better and worse ; the last injunction being strictly complied with. There should be septennial marriages, as well as septennial parliaments! … In life it is the irrevocable that is terrible : while there is change, there is hope. We should keep each other in much better order if, at the end of seven years, there were to be a reckoning of grievances. It would be a good moral lesson to many a husband, to come down on the seventh anniversary and find his tea not made, and his muffin not buttered. These are the things that come home to a man's feelings !"

"It merely shews, after all, that affection is a habit."

"Ah, tell me not that memory Sheds gladness o'er the past, What is recalled by faded flowers, Save that they did not last? Were it not better to forget, Than but remember and regret ?"

"Why, life must mock itself to mark how small Are the distinctions of its various pride. ‘Tis strange how we delight in the unreal; The fanciful and the fantastic make One half our triumphs. Not in mighty things — The glorious offerings of our mind to fate — Do we ask homage to our vanities, One half so much as from the false and vain : The petty trifles that the social world Has fancied into grandeur."

"When a woman has once made up her mind to be imprudent, she is very imprudent indeed ; …"

"Real feeling is shy of expression;"

"[From Lady Marchmont]: Universal conquest should be the motto of our sex. Every woman should try to make every man she sees in love with her."

"The presence of perpetual change Is ever on the earth; To-day is only as the soil That gives to-morrow birth."

"England may be deficient in public gardens, but where are there so many private ones, each the delight of their master, and the household that have planted their shrubs, and watered their flowers? What little worlds of affection and comfort are bounded by the neat quickset-hedge, quiet and still as the nest of some singing-bird !"

"This is the charm of poetry : it comes On sad perturbed moments ; and its thoughts, Like pearls amid the troubled waters, gleam. That which we garnered in our eager youth, Becomes a long delight in after years: The mind is strengthened, and the heart refreshed By some old memory of gifted words, That bring sweet feelings, answering to our own, Or dreams that waken some more lofty mood Than dwelleth with the commonplace of life."

"[From Lady Marchmont]: A swan always gives the idea of a court-lady, — stately in her grace, ruffling in her bravery, and conscious of the floating plumes that mark her pretensions. The peacock is a coquette ; it turns in the sunshine, it looks round as if to ask the conscious air of its purple and gold ; but the swan sails on in majestic tranquillity, it sees the fair image of its perfect grace on the waters below, and is content …"

"The political creed, of which expediency is the alpha and the omega, can never know the generous purpose, or the high result."

"Power is a debt to the people :"

"Nothing can be permitted to the few ; rights and advantages were sent for all …"

"Only by looking up, can we see heaven."

"Confidence is inseparable from human nature. Never was temper so reserved but it has its moments of unbending — moments when the full heart unlocks its secret fountains, and tells of emotions unsuspected, and thoughts hitherto concealed by the guarded brow and practised lip. Now, of all times and places calculated for confidence, there is no time like evening ; no place like sitting over the fire."

"Much may be said in favour of a long walk on a summer twilight ; the heart opens to the soft influences of the lovely hour; but those very influences distract us from ourselves. The eye is caught by the presence of the beautiful : the violets, half hidden in the long grass ; a branch of hawthorn, heavy with its fragrant load ; a cloud, on which the crimson shadow lingers to the last: — these are too fair to be passed by unnoticed ; they take us from our discourse with a half unconscious delight. Moreover, before the calm and subduing aspect of nature, human cares feel their own vanity. The lulling music of leaves, stirred only by the gentle wind, enters into the soul ; and the sweet, deep drawn, breath brings its own tranquillity."

"[From Constance’s letter]: Nothing but love can answer to love ; no affection, no kindness, no care, can supply its place : it is its own sweet want."

"Age is a dreary thing when left alone : It needs the sunshine brought by fresher years; It lives its youth again while seeing youth, And childhood brings its childhood back again."

"It is well that the body sometimes sinks beneath the mind ; …"

"How awful is the presence of the dead ! The hours rebuked, stand silent at their side Passions are hushed before that stern repose ; Two, and two only, sad exceptions share— Sorrow and love,—and these are paramount."

"Tis a fair tree, the almond-tree : there Spring Shews the first promise of her rosy wreath; Or ere the green leaves venture from the bud, Those fragile blossoms light the winter bough With delicate colours, heralding the rose. Whose own Aurora they might seem to be. What lurks beneath their faint and lovely red ? What the dark spirit in those fairy flowers ? Tis death !"

"And yet it is a wasted heart : It is a wasted mind That seeks not in the inner world Its happiness to find ; For happiness is like the bird That broods above its nest, And finds beneath its folded wings, Life's dearest, and its best."

"It is strange what society will endure from its idols."

"[From the Duke of Wharton]: I hope that you have heard the proposed alteration in the commandments at the last political meeting at Houghton ? Hanbury suggested that the 'not' should, in future, be omitted; but Doddington objected, as people might leave off doing wrong if it became a duty. At all events, they would not steal, covet, and bear false witness against their neighbour, with half the relish that they do at present."