Top 400 Lewis Carroll Quotes (2023 Update)
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251. “Who sail on stormy seas; And that’s the way I get my bread – A trifle, if you please.”

— Lewis Carroll

252. “Mine is a long and a sad tale!′ said the Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing. ‘It is a long tail, certainly,’ said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse’s tail; ’but why do you call it sad?”

— Lewis Carroll

253. “No good fish goes anywhere without a porpoise.”

— Lewis Carroll

254. “A tale begun in other days, When summer suns were glowing – A simple chime, that served to time The rhythm of your rowing – Whose echoes live in memory yet, Though envious years would say ’forget.”

— Lewis Carroll

255. “When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark, And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark: But, when the tide rises and sharks are around, His voice has a timid and tremulous sound.”

— Lewis Carroll

256. “Oh, ’tis love, ’tis love, that makes the world go round!”

— Lewis Carroll

257. “Speak roughly to your little boy and beat him when he sneezes! he only does it to annoy, because he knows it teases!”

— Lewis Carroll

258. “Fury said to a mouse, That he met in the house, “Let us both go to law: I will prosecute you. – Come, I’ll take no denial; We must have a trial: For really this morning I’ve nothing to do.” Said the mouse to the cur, “Such a trial, dear Sir, With no jury or judge, would be wasting our breath.” “I’ll be judge, I’ll be jury,” Said cunning old Fury: “I’ll try the whole cause, and condemn you to death.”

— Lewis Carroll

259. “And thus they give the time, that Nature meant for peaceful sleep and meditative snores, to ceaseless din and mindless merriment and waste of shoes and floors.”

— Lewis Carroll

260. “If everybody minded their own business,” the Duchess said, in a hoarse growl, “the world would go round a deal faster than it does.”

— Lewis Carroll

261. “So she sat on with closed eyes, and half believed herself in Wonderland, though she knew she had but to open them again, and all would change to dull reality.”

— Lewis Carroll

262. “Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a mile high to leave the court.”

— Lewis Carroll

263. “Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.”

— Lewis Carroll

264. “So young a child ought to know which way she’s going, even if she doesn’t know her own name!”

— Lewis Carroll

265. “You won’t make yourself a bit realer by crying.”

— Lewis Carroll

266. “If I had but the time and you had but the brain.”

— Lewis Carroll

267. “Anon, to sudden silence won, In fancy they pursue The dream-child moving through the land Of wonders wild and new, In friendly chat with bird or beast – And half believe it true.”

— Lewis Carroll

268. “She stretched herself up on tiptoe and peeped over the edge and her eyes immediately met those of a large blue caterpillar, that was sitting on the top, with its arms folded, quietly smoking a long hookah and taking not the smallest notice of her or of anything else.”

— Lewis Carroll

269. “If I wasn’t real,′ Alice said – half-laughing through her tears, it all seemed so ridiculous – ‘I shouldn’t be able to cry.’ ‘I hope you don’t suppose those are real tears?’ Tweedledum interrupted in a tone of great contempt.”

— Lewis Carroll

270. “I can explain all the poems that were ever invented – and a good many that haven’t been invented just yet.”

— Lewis Carroll

271. “Charles Lutwidge Dodgson’s life in space-time colored his liberated life of the imagination.”

— Lewis Carroll

272. “This was charming, no doubt; but they shortly found out That the Captain they trusted so well Had only one notion for crossing the ocean, And that was to tingle his bell.”

— Lewis Carroll

273. “The vast unfathomable sea Is but a Notion-unto me.”

— Lewis Carroll

274. “Why, you might just as well say that, I see what I eat, is the same as, I eat what I see.”

— Lewis Carroll

275. “Consider what a great girl you are. Consider what a long way you’ve come to-day. Consider what o’clock it is. Consider anything, only don’t cry!”

— Lewis Carroll

276. “I wish I could manage to be glad! Only I never can remember the rule. You must be very happy, living in this wood, and being glad whenever you like!”

— Lewis Carroll

277. “With a sort of mental squint.”

— Lewis Carroll

278. “I don’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it.”

— Lewis Carroll

279. “We haven’t any and you’re too young.”

— Lewis Carroll

280. “There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought!”

— Lewis Carroll

281. “The further off from England the nearer is to France- Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.”

— Lewis Carroll

282. “The Duchess! The Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and whiskers! She’ll get me executed, as sure as ferrets are ferrets! Where can I have dropped them, I wonder?”

— Lewis Carroll

283. “And is not that a Mother’s gentle hand that undraws your curtains, and a Mother’s sweet voice that summons you to rise? To rise and forget, in the bright sunlight, the ugly dreams that frightened you so when all was dark.”

— Lewis Carroll

284. “The recent extraordinary discovery in Photography, as applied in the operations of the mind, has reduced the art of novel-writing to the merest mechanical labour.”

— Lewis Carroll

285. “Oh, you can’t help that,′ said the cat. ‘We’re all mad here.”

— Lewis Carroll

286. “I don’t want to take up literature in a money-making spirit, or be very anxious about making large profits, but selling it at a loss is another thing altogether, and an amusement I cannot well afford.”

— Lewis Carroll

287. “I have had prayers answered – most strangely so sometimes – but I think our Heavenly Father’s loving-kindness has been even more evident in what He has refused me.”

— Lewis Carroll

288. “By which I get my wealth – And very gladly will I drink Your Honour’s noble health.”

— Lewis Carroll

289. “Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.”

— Lewis Carroll

290. “When I used to read fairy tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought! And when I grow up, I’ll write one – but I’m grown up now,” she added in a sorrowful tone: “at least there’s no room to grow up any more here.”

— Lewis Carroll

291. “Oh, what fun it’ll be, when they see me through the glass in here, and can’t get at me!”

— Lewis Carroll

292. “The chief difficulty Alice found at first was in managing her flamingo.”

— Lewis Carroll

293. “I’m very much afraid I didn’t mean anything but nonsense. Still, you know, words mean more than we mean to express when we use them; so a whole book ought to mean a great deal more than the writer means. So, whatever good meanings are in the book, I’m glad to accept as the meaning of the book.”

— Lewis Carroll

294. “They’ve a temper, some of them – particularly verbs, they’re the proudest – adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs...”

— Lewis Carroll

295. “I wish I could shut up like a telescope! I think I could, if I only knew how to begin.”

— Lewis Carroll

296. “There’s no use in comparing one’s feelings between one day and the next; you must allow a reasonable interval, for the direction of change to show itself.”

— Lewis Carroll

297. “I almost wish I hadn’t gone down that rabbit-hole – and yet – and yet – it’s rather curious, you know, this sort of life!”

— Lewis Carroll

298. “Serpent, I say again!′ repeated the Pigeon, but in a more subdued tone, and added with a kind of sob, ‘I’ve tried every way, and nothing seems to suit them!’ ‘I haven’t the least idea what you’re talking.”

— Lewis Carroll

299. “And as in uffish thought he stood, The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, And burbled as it came! One, two! One, two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back.”

— Lewis Carroll

300. “Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!”

— Lewis Carroll