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What destroys us most effectively is not a malign fate but our own capacity for self-deception and for degrading our own best self.

George Eliot

Character is not cut in marble – it is not something solid and unalterable. It is something living and changing, and may become diseased as our bodies do.
GEORGE ELIOT

Character Cut Marble Something Unalterable
Wear a smile and have friends; wear a scowl and have wrinkles.
GEORGE ELIOT

Friend Scowl Smile Wear Wrinkle
Enveloped in a common mist, we seem to walk in clearness ourselves, and behold only the mist that enshrouds others.
GEORGE ELIOT

Behold Clearness Common Enshrouldm Other Envelop Mist Ourselves Seem Walk
there are two ways of speaking an audience will always like: one is, to tell them what they don’t understand; and the other is, to tell them what they’re used to.
GEORGE ELIOT

Audience One Other Speak Tell Them Understand Walkways Way
When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of, but our severity.
GEORGE ELIOT

Come Earth Great never Repent Severity Tenderness
Examining the world in order to find consolation is very much like looking carefully over the pages of a great book in order to find our own name . … Whether we find what we want or not, our preoccupation has hindered us from a true knowledge of the contents.
GEORGE ELIOT

Book Carefully Consolation Examine Find Great Look Much Order Over Own Page World
The darkest night that ever fell upon the earth never hid the light, never put out the stars. It only made the stars more keenly, kindly glancing, as if in protest against the darkness.
GEORGE ELIOT

Darkest Earth Fell Keenly Light Made Night Star Start Upon
It is painful to be told that anything is very fine and not be able to feel that it is fine–something like being blind, while people talk of the sky.
GEORGE ELIOT

Able Being Blind Feel Fine Painful People Sky Something Talk Thing Told
The important work of moving the world forward does not wait to be done by perfect men.
GEORGE ELIOT

Done Forward Important Men Moving Perfect Want Work World
I like not only to be loved, but also to be told I am loved.
GEORGE ELIOT

Like Love Not Only Told
A friend is one to whom one may pour out the contents of one’s heart, chaff and grain together, knowing that gentle hands will take and sift it, keep what is worth keeping, and with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away.
GEORGE ELIOT

Chaff Content Friend Gentile Grain Hand Heart Know Many Own Pour Together
The troublesome ones in a family are usually either the wits or the idiots.
GEORGE ELIOT

Either Family Idiot Troublesome Usually Visit
What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other?
GEORGE ELIOT

Difficulty Each Other Less Live Make
Trouble’s made us kin.
GEORGE ELIOT

Made Trouble Us
People are so ridiculous with their illusions, carrying their fool’s caps unawares, thinking their own lies opaque while everybody else’s are transparent, making themselves exceptions to everything, as if when all the world looked yellow under a lamp they alone are rosy.
GEORGE ELIOT

Cap Carry Else Everybody Fool Ilusion Lie Opaque Own People Ridiculous Think Unaware
It is a narrow mind which cannot look at a subject from various points of view.
GEORGE ELIOT

Mind Narrow Point Subject Various View

What destroys us most effectively is not a malign fate but our own capacity for self-deception and for degrading our own best self.

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What destroys us most effectively is not a malign fate but our own capacity for self-deception and for degrading our own best self.

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Popular Authors

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