Mary Elizabeth Braddon Quotes & Sayings

George could only stare at the young lady's kindling face, which lighted up all in a moment, and was suddenly beautiful, like some transparency which seems a dingy picture till you put a lamp behind it. The young surgeon could only stare wonderingly at Mr. Sleaford's daughter, for he hadn't the faintest idea what she and his friend were talking about. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Phoebe Marks was a person who never lost her individuality. Silent and self-contained, she seemed to hold herself within herself, and take no colour from the outer world. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

It is taken as a strong proof of a man's innocence that he should look you full in the face with a steadfast gaze when you look at him with suspicion plainly visible in your eyes; but would he not be the poorest villain if he shirked that encounter of glances when he knows full surely that he is in that moment put to the test? It is rather innocence whose eyelids drop when you peer too closely into its eyes, for innocence is appalled by the stern, accusing glances which it is unprepared to meet. Guilt stares you boldly in the face, for guilt is hardened and defiant, and has this one grand superiority over innocence
that it is prepared for the worst. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Amiability is the redeeming quality of fools. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Why, I can't help smiling at people, and speaking prettily to them. I know I'm no better than the rest of the world; but I can't help it if I'm pleasanter. It's constitutional. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

He was a square, pale-faced man of almost forty, and had the appearance of having outlived every emotion to which humanity is subject. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

It is easy to starve, but it is difficult to stoop. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Guilt soon learns to lie. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

He was a student - such things as happened to him, happen sometimes to students.
He was a German - such things as happened to him, happen sometimes to Germans.
He was young, handsome, studious, enthusiastic, metaphysical, reckless, unbelieving, heartless.
And being young, handsome, and eloquent he was beloved. ("The Cold Embrace") — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

There were many beautiful vipers in those days and she was one of them. ("Eveline's Visitant") — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

We hear every day of murders committed in the country. Brutal and treacherous murders; slow, protracted agonies from poisons administered by some kindred hand; sudden and violent deaths by cruel blows, inflicted with a stake cut from some spreading oak, whose every shadow promised - peace. In the county of which I write, I have been shown a meadow in which, on a quiet summer Sunday evening, a young farmer murdered the girl who had loved and trusted him; and yet, even now, with the stain of that foul deed upon it, the aspect of the spot is - peace. No species of crime has ever been committed in the worst rookeries about Seven Dials that has not been also done in the face of that rustic calm which still, in spite of all, we look on with a tender, half-mournful yearning, and associate with - peace. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Surely a pretty woman never looks prettier than when making tea. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

The strongest proof of repentance is the endeavor to atone. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

London's like a forest ... we shall be lost in it. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Paris is a mighty schoolmaster, a grand enlightener of the provincial intellect. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Life is such a very troublesome matter, when all is said and done, that it's as well even to take its blessings quietly. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Exceptional talent does not always win its reward unless favored by exceptional circumstances. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

A priest can achieve great victories with an army of women at his command. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Our virtues, as well as our vices, are often scourges for our own backs. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Do you think I will suffer myself to be baffled? — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

There can be no reconciliation where there is no open warfare. There must be a battle, a brave boisterous battle, with pennants waving and cannon roaring, before there can be peaceful treaties and enthusiastic shaking of hands. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

What have you to do with hearts, except for dissection? — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

How chronic is the unconcern of men and women of the world! — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

My intellect is a little way upon the wrong side of that narrow boundary-line between sanity and insanity. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Sir Harry Towers cares. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

The Eastern potentate who declared that women were at the bottom of all mischief, should have gone a little further and seen why it is so. It is because women are never lazy. They don't know what it is to be quiet. They are Semiramides, and Cleopatras, and Joan of Arcs, Queen Elizabeths, and Catharine the Seconds, and they riot in battle, and murder, and clamour, and desperation. If they can't agitate the universe and play at ball with hemispheres, they'll make mountains of warfare and vexation out of domestic molehills; and social storms in household teacups. Forbid them to hold forth upon the freedom of nations and the wrongs of mankind, and they'll quarrel with Mrs Jones about the shape of a mantle or the character of a small maid-servant. To call them the weaker sex is to utter a hideous mockery. They are the stronger sex, the nosier, the more persevering, the most self-assertive sex. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Self-assertion may deceive the ignorant for a time; but when the noise dies away, we cut open the drum, and find it was emptiness that made the music. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

And he knew that our dreams are none the less terrible to lose, because they have never been the realities for which we have mistaken them. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

[...] that magic power of fascination by which a woman can charm with a word or intoxicate with a smile — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

He thought of his love now as duty. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

There is a mental fatigue which is a spurious kind of remorse, and has all the anguish of the nobler feeling. It is an utter weariness and prostration of spirit, a sickness of heart and mind, a bitter longing to lie down and die. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

And thus they form a perfect group; he walks back two or three paces, selects his point of sight, and begins to sketch a hurried outline. He has finished it before they move; he hears their voices, though he cannot hear their words, and wonders what they can be talking of. Presently he walks on, and joins them.
'You have a corpse there, my friends?' he says.
'Yes; a corpse washed ashore an hour ago.'
'Drowned?'
'Yes, drowned; - a young girl, very handsome.'
'Suicides are always handsome,' he says; and then he stands for a little while idly smoking and meditating, looking at the sharp outline of the corpse and the stiff folds of the rough canvas covering.
Life is such a golden holiday to him young, ambitious, clever - that it seems as though sorrow and death could have no part in his destiny. ("The Cold Embrace") — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

You seem to have quite a taste for discussing these horrible subjects," she said, rather scornfully; "you ought to have been a detective police officer."
"I sometimes think I should have been a good one."
"Why?"
"Because I am patient. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

He forgot that love, which is a madness, and a scourge, and a fever, and a delusion, and a snare, is also a mystery, and very imperfectly understood by everyone except the individual sufferer who writhes under its tortures. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

You are plain, Coraline,' I said to myself; 'unmistakably plain. You have tolerable eyes, and good teeth; but your nose is a failure, your complexion is pallid, and your mouth is just twice too large for prettiness. Never forget that you are plain, my dear Coralie, and then perhaps other people won't remember quite so often. Shake hands with Fate, accept your thick nose and your pallid complexion as the stern necessities of your existence, and make the most of your eyes and teeth, and your average head of hair.' That is the gist of what I said to myself, in less sophisticated language, perhaps, before I was fifteen, and from that line of conduct I have never departed. So, if I have come to nineteen years of age without being admired, I have at least escaped being laughed at! — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

When once estrangement has arisen between those who truly love each other, everything seems to widen the breach. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Now love is so very subtle an essence, such an indefinable metaphysical marvel, that its due force, though very cruelly felt by the sufferer himself, is never clearly understood by those who look on at his torments and wonder why he takes the common fever so badly. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

They were dreamers - and they dreamt themselves into the cemetery. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

The Lord gave, and the Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord.' We repeated the holy sentences of resignation; but it was not resignation, it was despair that subdued the violence of our grief. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

A modern writer likens coquettes to those hunters who do not eat the game which they have successfully pursued. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

That he will haunt the footsteps of his enemy after death is the one revenge which a dying man can promise himself; and if men had power thus to avenge themselves the earth would be peopled with phantoms. ("Eveline's Visitant") — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

When the horror of his grief was new to him, and every object in life, however trifling or however important, seem saturated with his one great sorrow. — Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Why is it so difficult to love wisely, so easy to love too well? — Mary Elizabeth Braddon