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You, and those like you, take your fill of pleasure on earth by making the life of such as me bitter and black with sorrow; and then it is a fine thing, when you have had enough of that, to think of securing your pleasure in heaven by becoming converted!

Thomas Hardy

Pessimism is playing the sure game. You cannot lose at it; you may gain. It is the only view of life in which you can never be disappointed. Having reckoned what to do in the worst possible circumstances, when better arise, as they may, life becomes child’s play.
THOMAS HARDY

Better Children Disappoint Game Life Lose Play Possible Worst
Beauty lay not in the thing, but in what the thing symbolized.
THOMAS HARDY

Beautiful Symbol
And at home by the fire, whenever you look up there I shall be— and whenever I look up, there will be you.
THOMAS HARDY

Fire God Home Love Myself Yourself
The sky was clear – remarkably clear – and the twinkling of all the stars seemed to be but throbs of one body, timed by a common pulse.
THOMAS HARDY

Body Remark Sky Stars Time
And yet to every bad there is a worse.
THOMAS HARDY

Bad One Liner Worst
She moved about in a mental cloud of many-coloured idealities, which eclipsed all sinister contingencies by its brightness.
THOMAS HARDY

Bright Ideal Mental Sin
Well, these sad and hopeless obstacles are welcome in one sense, for they enable us to look with indifference upon the cruel satires that Fate loves to indulge in.
THOMAS HARDY

Cruelty Different Fate Hope Indulgence Love Obstacle Sad
It appears that ordinary men take wives because possession is not possible without marriage, and that ordinary women accept husbands because marriage is not possible without possession.
THOMAS HARDY

Acceptance Appearance Husband Man Marriage Ordinary Possession Woman
Remember that the best and greatest among mankind are those who do themselves no worldly good. Every successful man is more or less a selfish man. The devoted fail.
THOMAS HARDY

Best Devotion Failure Greatness Kind Man Remember Selfish
Indifference to fate which, though it often makes a villain of a man, is the basis of his sublimity when it does not.
THOMAS HARDY

Fate Man Villain
But his dreams were as gigantic as his surroundings were small.
THOMAS HARDY

Dreams Small Surround
If Galileo had said in verse that the world moved, the inquisition might have let him alone.
THOMAS HARDY

Alone Himself Move Talk World
Some folk want their luck buttered.
THOMAS HARDY

Friendship Lucky One Liner
O, you have torn my life all to pieces… made me be what I prayed you in pity not to make me be again!
THOMAS HARDY

Life Myself Pieces Prayer
I wish I had never been born–there or anywhere else.
THOMAS HARDY

Born Fantasy
Do not do an immoral thing for moral reasons.
THOMAS HARDY

Moral Reason Wrong

You, and those like you, take your fill of pleasure on earth by making the life of such as me bitter and black with sorrow; and then it is a fine thing, when you have had enough of that, to think of securing your pleasure in heaven by becoming converted!

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You, and those like you, take your fill of pleasure on earth by making the life of such as me bitter and black with sorrow; and then it is a fine thing, when you have had enough of that, to think of securing your pleasure in heaven by becoming converted!

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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