Anna Sewell Quotes

Give me the handling of a horse for twenty minutes, and I'll tell you what sort of a groom he has had.

He said cruelty was the devil's own trade-mark, and if we saw any one who took pleasure in cruelty we might know who he belonged to, for the devil was a murderer from the beginning, and a tormentor to the end. On the other hand, where we saw people who loved their neighbors, and were kind to man and beast, we might know that was God's mark.

We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words.

Why don't they cut their own children's ears into points to make them look sharp? Why don't they cut off their noses to make them look plucky? One would be just as sensible as the other. What right have they to torment and disfigure God's creatures?

Do you know why this world is as bad as it is?... It is because people think only about their own business, and won't trouble themselves to stand up for the oppressed, nor bring the wrong-doers to light... My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt.

He has known joy and violence. Felt the warmth of children and the cruelty of abuse. He has nearly died saving lives and merely been killed by a drunken act. He has known the finery of grand estates and the filth of stinking slums. He has survived fire and flood, starvation and torment. And nothing could break his spirit-or his great love. This is HIS life. He is called the horse.

It is good people who make good places

I must say...that more unmanly, brutal treatment of a little pony it was never my painful lot to witness; and by giving way to such passion, you injure your own character as much, nay more, than you injure your horse, and remember, we shall all have to be judged according to our works, whether they be towards man or towards beast.

He is called the horse

If a thing is right it can be done, and if it is wrong it can be done without; and a good man will find a way.

I am never afraid of what I know.

Oh! if people knew what a comfort to a horse a light hand is.

God had given men reason, by which they could find out things for themselves, but He had given animals knowledge which did not depend on reason, and which was much more prompt and perfect in its way, and by which they had often saved the lives of men.

Now I say that with cruelty and oppression it is everybody's business to interfere when they see it.

I don't believe in religion, for I don't see that your religious people are any better than the rest.

Though I am an old horse, and have seen and heard a great deal, I never yet could make out why men are so fond of this sport; they often hurt themselves, often spoil good horses, and tear up the fields, and all for a hare, or a fox, or a stag, that they could get more easily some other way; but we are only horses, and don't know.

My troubles are over, and I am finally home.

There is no religion without love, and people may talk as much as they like about their religion, but if it does not teach them to be good and kind to man and beast, it is all a sham.

What right had they to make me suffer like that?

My troubles are all over, and I am at home; and often before I am quite awake, I fancy I am still in the orchard at Birtwick, standing with my friends under the apple trees.

The first place that I can well remember was a large pleasant meadow with a pond clear water in it. Some shady trees leaned over it, and rushes and water-lilies grew at the deep end.

If you in the morning Throw minutes away, You can't pick them up In the course of a day. You may hurry and scurry, And flurry and worry, You've lost them forever, Forever and aye.

If you get into the habit of being quick it is just as easy as being slow.

Only ignorance! only ignorance! how can you talk about only ignorance? Don't you know that it is the worst thing in the world, next to wickedness? -- and which does the most mischief heaven only knows. If people can say, `Oh! I did not know, I did not mean any harm,' they think it is all right.

My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt.