Inspirational Quotations

Inspirational Quotes by William Makepeace Thackeray (English Novelist)

William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–63) was a great Victorian novelist whose central literary theme was the expansion of human sympathy.

Born in Calcutta, British India, as the only son of a distinguished member of the India civil service, Thackeray was brought up in luxury reminiscent of a young prince. He was sent to England for his schooling at age five. He attended Cambridge, but left without graduating, after losing some of his inheritance through gambling and business failure. His Indian upbringing and his public school experience feature prominently in The Newcomes (1853–55.)

In 1848, after a long and often disappointing exploration for a profession and a literary voice, Thackeray’s definite breakthrough came with his serialized novel, Vanity Fair (1847–48.) This classic novel about the rise and fall of an Irish adventurer, set at the time of Waterloo and its aftermath, was a satire of the English upper-middle class of early 19th-century society.

Thackeray spent his last decade as a literary celebrity and the editor of the Cornhill magazine.

More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by William Makepeace Thackeray

All is vanity, look you; and so the preacher is vanity too.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Vanity

If you take temptations into account, who is to say that he is better than his neighbor?
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Temptation

Benevolent feeling ennobles the most trifling actions.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Benevolence

Let a man who has to make his fortune in life remember this maxim: Attacking is the only secret. Dare and the world yields, or if it beats you sometimes, dare it again and you will succeed.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Fortune, Courage, Risk

Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Mothers, Mother, Mothers Day

It is best to love wisely, no doubt: but to love foolishly is better than not to be able to love at all.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

To be a gentleman is to be honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, to be wise, and possessing all those qualities to exercise them in the most graceful outward manner.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

All men who avoid female society have dull perceptions and are stupid, or else have gross tastes, and revolt against what is pure.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Woman

Despair is perfectly compatible with a good dinner, I promise you.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Despair

It’s not dying for faith that’s so hard, it’s living up to it.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Faith

Life is the soul’s nursery – its training place for the destinies of eternity.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

Good humor is one of the best articles of dress one can wear in society.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Humor

Except for the young or very happy, I can’t say I am sorry for anyone who dies.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Dying, Death

A good laugh is sunshine in a house.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Cheerfulness, Laughter

I never knew a man of letters ashamed of his profession.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Literature

Parting and forgetting?—What faithful heart can do these?—Our great thoughts, our great affections, the truths of our life, never leave us.—Surely, they cannot be separate from our consciousness; will follow it whithersoever that shall go, and are, of their nature, divine and immortal.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

To endure is greater than to dare; to tire out hostile fortune; to be daunted by no difficulty; to keep heart when all have lost it; to go through intrigue spotless; to forego even ambition when the end is gained—who can say this is not greatness?
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Greatness & Great Things, Patience, Perseverance

Whenever he met a great man he groveled before him, and my-lorded him as only a free-born Briton can do.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Persuasion

You who are ashamed of your poverty, and blush for your calling, are a snob; as are you who boast of your pedigree, or are proud of your wealth.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Pride

It is to the middle-class we must look for the safety of England.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Class

People hate as they love, unreasonably.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Hatred, Hate

Perhaps a gentleman is a rarer man than some of us think for. Which of us can point out many such in his circle; men whose aims are generous, whose truth is not only constant in its kind, but elevated in its degree; whose want of meanness makes them simple, who can look the world honestly in the face with an equal manly sympathy for the great and the small.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

It is only hope which is real, and reality is a bitterness and a deceit.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Bitterness

‘Tis not the dying for a faith that’s so hard… ‘Tis the living up to it that’s difficult.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Faith

Vanity is often the unseen spur.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Vanity

People who do not know how to laugh are always pompous and self-conceited.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Vanity, Conceit

Bravery never goes out of style.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Courage, Brave

The acknowledgment of weakness which we make in imploring to be relieved from hunger and from temptation, is surely wisely put in our prayer. Think of it, you who are rich, and take heed how you turn a beggar away.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

A snob is one who is always pretending to be something better—especially richer or more fashionable than others.
—William Makepeace Thackeray

Do not be in a hurry to succeed. What would you have to live for afterwards? Better make the horizon your goal; it will always be ahead of you.
—William Makepeace Thackeray
Topics: Success & Failure, Success

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