Top 380 Elizabeth Gaskell Quotes (2026 Update)
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51. “By-and-by they’ll find out, tyrants makes liars.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

52. “He could not forget the touch of her arms around his neck, impatiently felt as it had been at the time; but now the recollection of her clinging defence of him, seemed to thrill him through and through, – to melt away every resolution, all power of self-control, as if it were wax before a fire.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

53. “They forgot that the strike was in this instance the consequence of want and need, suffered unjustly, as the endurers believed; for, however insane, and without ground of reason, such was their belief, and such was the cause of their violence. It is a great truth that you cannot extinguish violence by violence. You may put it down for a time; but while you are crowing over your imaginary success, see if it does not return with seven devils worse than its former self! No.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

54. “Man, through all ages of revolving time, Unchanging man, in every varying clime, Deems his own land of every land the pride, Beloved by heaven o’er all the world beside; Home, the spot of earth supremely blest, A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

55. “She lay with her face to the wall, muttering low, but muttering always: Alas! alas! what is done in youth can never be undone in age! what is done in youth can never be undone in age!”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

56. “All this gladness in life, all honest pride in doing my work in the world, all this keen sense of being, I owe to her!” And it doubles the gladness, it makes the pride glow, it sharpens the sense of existence till I hardly know if it is pain or pleasure, to think that I owe it to one – to one whom I love, as I do not believe man ever loved woman before.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

57. “That kind of patriotism which consists in hating all other nations.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

58. “I am a man. I claim the right of expressing my feelings.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

59. “Nothing like the act of eating for equalizing men. Dying is nothing to it.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

60. “Miss Jenkyns wore a cravat, and a little bonnet like a jockey-cap, and altogether had the appearance of a strong-minded woman; although she would have despised the modern idea of women being equal to men. Equal, indeed! she knew they were superior.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

Featured in: Strong Quotes

61. “My precept is, “Do something, my sister, do good if you can; but, at any rate, do something.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

62. “In all disappointments sympathy is a great balm.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

63. “I never did write a biography, and I don’t exactly know how to set about it; you see I have to be accurate and keep to the facts, a most difficult thing for a writer of fiction.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

64. “It is to God you answer, not to men. The shame of having your sin known to the world, should be as nothing to the shame you felt at having sinned. We have dreaded men too much, and God too little, in the course we have taken.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

65. “Oh yes!? and suddenly the wintry frost-bound look of care had left Mr. Thornton’s face, as if some soft summer gale had blown all anxiety away from his mind; and, though his mouth was as much compressed as before, his eyes smiled out benignly on his questioner.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

66. “Oh, my Margaret – my Margaret! no one can tell what you are to me! Dead – cold as you lie there you are the only woman I ever loved! Oh, Margaret – Margaret!”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

67. “His greatest comfort was in hugging his torment; and in feeling, as he had indeed said to her, that though she might despise him, contemn him, treat him with her proud sovereign indifference, he did not change one whit. She could not make him change. He loved her and would love her; and defy her, and this miserable bodily pain.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

68. “A little credulity helps one on through life very smoothly.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

69. “Real meekness of character is called out by experience of kindness.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

70. “It had been a royal time of luxury to him, with all its stings and contumelies, compared to the poverty that crept round and clipped the anticipation of the future down to sordid fact, and life without an atmosphere of either hope or fear.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

71. “Was he bewitched by those beautiful eyes, that soft, half-open, sighing mouth which lay so close upon his shoulder only yesterday? He could not even shake off the recollection that she had been there; that her arms had been round him, once – if never again.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

72. “One may be clogged with honey and unable to rise and fly.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

73. “By degrees they spoke of education, and the book-learning that forms one part of it; and the result was that Ruth determined to get up early all throughout the bright summer mornings, to acquire the knowledge hereafter to be give to her child. Her mind was uncultivated, her reading scant; beyond the mere mechanical arts of education she knew nothing; but she had a refined taste, and excellent sense and judgment to separate the true from the false.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

74. “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.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

75. “I could wish there were a God, if it were only to ask him to bless thee.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

76. “I have passed out of childhood into old age. I have had no youth – no womanhood; the hopes of womanhood have closed for me – for I shall never marry; and I anticipate cares and sorrows just as if I were an old woman, and with the same fearful spirit.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

77. “Honi soit qui mal y pense.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

78. “Well, He had known what love was-a sharp pang, a fierce experience, in the midst of whose flames he was struggling! but, through that furnace he would fight his way out into the serenity of middle age,-all the richer and more human for having known this great passion.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

79. “Let us alone, little woman. We understand each other, don’t we, doctor? Why, bless your life, he gives me better than he gets many a time; only, you see, he sugars it over, and says a sharp thing, and pretends it’s all civility and humility; but I can tell when he’s giving me a pill.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

80. “I would not trust a mouse to a woman if a man’s judgment could be had.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

81. “Sally, do you think God has put us into the world just to be selfish, and do nothing but see after our own souls? or to help one another with heart and hand, as Christ did to all who wanted help?”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

82. “The vices of the poor sometimes astound us HERE; but when the secrets of all hearts shall be made known, their virtues will astound us in far greater degree. Of this I am certain.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

83. “Really it is very wholesome exercise, this trying to make one’s words represent one’s thoughts, instead of merely looking to their effect on others.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

84. “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.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

Featured in: Romance Quotes

85. “Trust a girl of sixteen for knowing well if she is pretty; concerning her plainness she may be ignorant.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

86. “He shook hands with Margaret. He knew it was the first time their hands had met, though she was perfectly unconscious of the fact.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

87. “But how would you have a wedding arranged?’ ‘Oh, I have never thought much about it; only I should like it to be a very fine summer morning; and I should like to walk to church through the shade of trees;.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

88. “Her thoughts are full of other things just now; and people have such different ways of showing feeling: some by silence, some by words.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

89. “But the trees were gorgeous in their autumnal leafiness – the warm odours of flowers and herb came sweet upon the sense.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

90. “But Mr. Hale resolved that he would not be disturbed by any such nonsensical idea; so he lay awake, determining not to think about it.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

91. “But ne’er mind. We’re but where we was; and I’ll break stones on th’ road afore I let these little uns clem.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

92. “I don’t believe there’s a man in Milton who knows how to sit still; and it is a great art.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

93. “I had such a mother as few are blest with; a woman of strong power, and firm resolve.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

94. “But these factory people, who on earth wears cotton that can afford linen?”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

95. “I put it to the touch once, and I lost it all. Let her go – with her stony heart, and her beauty; – how set and terrible her look is now, for all her loveliness of feature! She is afraid I shall speak what will require some stern repression. Let her go. Beauty and heiress as she may be, she will find it hard to meet with a truer heart than mine. Let her go!”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

96. “Ask, and it shall be given until you. That is no vain or untried promise, Ruth!”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

97. “Looking back upon the year’s accumulated heap of troubles, Margaret wondered how they had been borne. If she could have anticipated them, how she would have shrunk away and hid herself from the coming time! And yet day by day had, of itself, and by itself, been very endurable – small, keen, bright little spots of positive enjoyment having come sparkling into the very middle of sorrows.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

98. “Why, they took nouns that were signs of things which gave evidence of wealth, – housekeepers, under-gardeners, extent of glass, valuable lace, diamonds, and all such things; and each one formed her speech so as to bring them all in, in the prettiest accidental manner possible.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

99. “He almost said to himself that he did not like her, before their conversation ended; he tried so hard to compensate himself for the mortified feeling, that while he looked upon her with an admiration he could not repress, she looked at him with proud indifference, taking him, he thought, for what, in his irritation, he told himself – was a great fellow, with not a grace or a refinement about him.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell

100. “Every mile was redolent of associations, which she would not have missed for the world, but each of which made her cry upon ‘the days that are no more’ with ineffable longing.”

— Elizabeth Gaskell