William Makepeace Thackeray Quotes

Let us people who are so uncommonly clever and learned have a great tenderness and pity for the poor folks who are not endowed with the prodigious talents which we have.

This Bouillabaisse a noble dish is - A sort of soup or broth, or brew, Or hotchpotch of all sorts of fishes, That Greenwich never could outdo; Green herbs, red peppers, mussels, saffron, Soles, onions, garlic, roach, and dace; All these you eat at Terre's tavern, In that one dish of Bouillabaisse.

Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? or, having it, is satisfied?

She lived in her past life — every letter seemed to recall some circumstance of it. How well she remembered them all! His looks and tones, his dress, what he said and how — these relics and remembrances of dead affection were all that were left her in the world.

People hate as they love, unreasonably.

At certain periods of life, we live years of emotion in a few weeks, and look back on those times as on great gaps between the old life and the new.

There are a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not know till he takes up a pen to write.

There are many sham diamonds in this life which pass for real, and vice versa.

Pray, dear madam, another glass; it is Christmas time, it will do you no harm.

Lucky he who has been educated to bear his fate, whatsoever it may be, by an early example of uprightness, and a childish training in honor.

Nature has written a letter of credit upon some men's faces that is honored wherever presented. You cannot help trusting such men. Their very presence gives confidence. There is promise to pay in their faces which gives confidence and you prefer it to another man's endorsement. Character is credit.

Come children, let us shut up the box and the puppets, for our play is played out.

Perhaps all early love affairs ought to be strangled or drowned, like so many blind kittens.

Choose a good disagreeable friend, if you be wise--a surly, steady, economical, rigid fellow.

Benevolence and feeling ennoble the most trifling actions.

What is a gentleman? It is to be honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, to be wise; and possessed of all these qualities to exercise them in the most graceful manner.