For singing till his heaven fills,
Tis love of earth that he instills,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup,
And he the wine which over flows
To lift us with him as he goes.
—George Meredith
Topics: Wine
Kissing don’t last; cookery do!
—George Meredith
Topics: Cooking, Eating, Food
A human act once set in motion flows on forever to the great account. Our deathlessness is in what we do, not in what we are.
—George Meredith
Topics: Dying, Death
Speech is the small change of silence.
—George Meredith
Topics: Speech, Conversation
A kiss is but a kiss now! and no wave of a great flood that whirls me to the sea. But, as you will! we’ll sit contentedly, and eat our pot of honey on the grave.
—George Meredith
Ah, what a dusty answer gets the soul when hot for certainties in this, our life.
—George Meredith
Topics: Certainty
Not till the fire is dying in the grate, Look we for any kinship with the stars. Oh, wisdom never comes when it is gold, And the great price we paid for it full worth: We have it only when we are half earth. Little avails that coinage to the old!
—George Meredith
Topics: Age, Aging
Memoirs are the backstairs of history.
—George Meredith
Topics: Legacy, Biography
Ah, what a dusty answer gets the soul when hot for certainties in this, our life.
—George Meredith
Topics: Doubt, Uncertainty
Prayer for worldly goods is worse than fruitless, but prayer for strength of soul is that passion of the soul which catches the gift it seeks.
—George Meredith
Topics: Prayer
There is nothing the body suffers which the soul may not profit by.
—George Meredith
Topics: Profit, The Body, Adversity, Difficulties
Possession without obligation to the object possessed approaches felicity.
—George Meredith
Topics: Duty
The season of love is the carnival of egoism and it brings a touchstone to our natures.
—George Meredith
Topics: Love
Jealousy is love bed of burning snarl.
—George Meredith
Topics: Jealousy
Chance works for us when we are good captains.
—George Meredith
Topics: Chance, Fortune, Luck
I expect that Woman will be the last thing civilized by Man.
—George Meredith
Topics: Women
That rarest gift to Beauty, Common Sense!
—George Meredith
Topics: Common Sense
Caricature is rough truth.
—George Meredith
Topics: Arts, Artists, Art
Passions spin the plot: We are betrayed by what is false within.
—George Meredith
Topics: Being Ourselves, Passion
Sunrays, leaning on our southern hills and lighting
Wild cloud-mountains that drag the hills along,
Oft ends the day of your shifting brilliant laughter
Chill as a dull face frowning on a song.
Ay, but shows the South-west a ripple-feathered bosom
Blown to silver while the clouds are shaken and ascend
Scaling the mid-heavens as they stream, there comes a sunset
Rich, deep like love in beauty without end.
—George Meredith
Who rises from prayer a better man, his prayer is answered.
—George Meredith
Topics: Prayer
Cynicism is intellectual dandyism.
—George Meredith
Topics: Positive Attitudes, Mindsets, Optimism, Cynicism, Pessimism
She heard the snuffle of hypocrisy in her prayer. She had to cease to pray.
—George Meredith
Topics: Prayer
Faith works miracles. At least it allows time for them
—George Meredith
Topics: Miracles
Always imitate the behavior of the winners when you lose.
—George Meredith
Topics: Winning, Acting As If
The most dire disaster in love is the death of imagination.
—George Meredith
Topics: Imagination
She poured a little social sewage into his ears.
—George Meredith
Topics: Gossip
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
Thomas Hardy English Novelist, Poet
Edward Lear English Humorist, Illustrator
Charles Reade British Author
Dante Gabriel Rossetti British Poet, Artist
Ford Madox Ford English Novelist, Poet, Critic
Matthew Arnold English Poet, Critic
A. E. Housman English Scholar, Poet
Leigh Hunt British Author
Laurence Housman English Novelist, Dramatist
J. B. Priestley British Novelist, Playwright, Essayist