“That is the injustice of a woman's lot. A woman has to bring up her children; and that means to restrain them, to deny them things they want, to set them tasks, to punish them when they do wrong, to do all the unpleasant things. And then the father, who has nothing to do but pet them and spoil them, comes in when all her work is done and steals their affection from her.”

“I have never admitted the right of an elderly author to alter the work of a young author, even when the young author happens to be his former self.”

“You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?”

“Our laws make law impossible; our liberties destroy all freedom; our property is organized robbery; our morality an impudent hypocrisy; our wisdom is administered by inexperienced or mal-experienced dupes; our power wielded by cowards and weaklings; and our honour false in all its points. I am an enemy of the existing order for good reasons”

“If I refuse to allow my leg to be amputated, its mortification and my death may prove that I was wrong; but if I let the leg go, nobody can ever prove that it would not have mortified had I been obstinate. Operation is therefore the safe side for the surgeon as well as the lucrative side.”

“He is not worthy of the honey-comb, that shuns the hives because the bees have stings.”

“Men that hazard allDo it in hope of fair advantages:A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross.”

“Were it goodTo set the exact wealth of all our statesAll at one cast? to set so rich a mainOn the nice hazard of one doubtful hour?It were not good.”

“Be great in act, as you have been in thought.”

“My free drift Halts not particularly, but moves itself In a wide sea of wax; no levelled malice Infects one comma in the course I hold, But flies an eagle flight, bold and forth on, Leaving no tract behind.”

“Talking isn't doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds.”

“My endeavorsHave ever come too short of my desires.Yet filed with my abilities.”

“To climb steep hills requires a slow pace at first.”

“...lest too light winning make the prize light.”

“You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will more willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, except my life.”

“Come, Lady, die to live.”

“To be, or not to be, that is the question: Whether 'tis Nobler in the mind to suffer The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune, Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles, And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep No more; and by a sleep, to say we end The Heart-ache, and the thousand Natural shocks That Flesh is heir to? 'Tis a consummation Devoutly to be wished. To die to sleep, To sleep, perchance to Dream; Aye, there's the rub.”

“The great will not condescend to take anything seriously.”

“Why has my motley diary no jokes? Because it is a soliloquy and every man is grave alone.”

“It is my belief, you cannot deal with the most serious things in the world unless you understand the most amusing.”