Signs are small measurable things, but interpretations are illimitable, and in girls of sweet, ardent nature, every sign is apt to conjure up wonder, hope, belief, vast as a sky, and colored by a thimbleful of matter in the shape of knowledge....wrong reasoning sometimes lands poor mortals in right conclusions: starting a long way off the true point, and proceeding by loops and zigzags, we now and then arrive just where we ought to be. Just because Miss Brooke was hasty in her trust, it is not therefore clear that Mr. Casaubon was unworthy of it.
George EliotIgnorance is not so damnable as humbug, but when it prescribes pills it may happen to do more harm.
George EliotIt is easy to say how we love new friends, and what we think of them, but words can never trace out all the fibers that knit us to the old.
George EliotWhat 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