Do you know that I have undergone three quarters of this labour entirely for the sake of the fourth quarter?
Thomas HardyDon't think of what's past!" said she. "I am not going to think outside of now. Why should we! Who knows what tomorrow has in store?
Thomas HardyThe social mould civilization fits us into have no more relation to our actual shapes than the conventional shapes of the constellations have to the real star-patterns. I am called Mrs. Richard Phillotson, living a calm wedded life with my counterpart of that name. But I am not really Mrs. Richard Phillotson, but a woman tossed about, all alone, with aberrant passions, and unaccountable antipathies.
Thomas HardyIndifference to fate which, though it often makes a villain of a man, is the basis of his sublimity when it does not.
Thomas HardyGeorge's son had done his work so thoroughly that he was considered too good a workman to live, and was, in fact, taken and tragically shot at twelve o'clock that same day—another instance of the untoward fate which so often attends dogs and other philosophers who follow out a train of reasoning to its logical conclusion, and attempt perfectly consistent conduct in a world made up so largely of compromise.
Thomas Hardy