E.D.E.N. Southworth Quotes

“There are some persons whom we can never make happy. It is not in them to be so.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Now, my dear Cap, if you don't look sharp your hour is come! Nothing on earth will save you, Cap, but your own wits! For if ever I saw mischief in any one's face, it is in that fellow's that is eating you up with his great eyes at the same time that he is laughing at you with his big mouth! Now Cap, my little man, be a woman!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Ah, it is impossible."
"No, it is only very difficult - so very difficult that I shall be sure to accomplish it!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“The priest then turning toward the bride, inquired:
"Wilt thou have this man to be thy wedded husband, etc., etc., so long as ye both shall live?"
To which the bride, throwing aside her veil, answered, firmly:
"No! Not if he were the last man and I the last woman on the face of the earth and the human race was about to become extinct and the angel of Gabriel came down from above to ask it of me as a personal favor."
The effect of this outburst, this revelation, this explosion, may be imagined but can never be adequately described.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Catch me coming to my senses, when it's so delightful to be mad. I'm too sharp for that.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“But, my dear, if you should be caught out in the storm!"
"Why, I don't know but I should like it! What harm could it do? I'm not soluble in water - rain won't melt me away! I think upon the whole I rather prefer being caught in the storm," said Cap, perversely.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Freedom and peace is even sweeter than wealth and honors.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

It was your destiny - let us hope it will prove a glorious one.

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Things difficult - almost to impossibility - can always be accomplished. Write that upon your tablets, for it is a valuable truth.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“There is some advantage in having imagination, since that visionary faculty opens the mental eyes to facts that more practical and duller intellects could never see.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“I wonder how long they'll keep me here? Forever, I hope. Until I get cured. I hope they won't cure me; I vow I won't be cured. It's a great deal too pleasant to be mad, and I'll stay so.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Now, the soul of Capitola naturally abhorred sentiment. If ever she gave way to serious emotion, she was sure to avenge herself by being more capricious than before.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Fie on it! Cowardice is worse than death!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Be silent!" shrieked the beldame.
"I won't!" said Cap. "Because you see, if we are in for the horrible, I can beat you hollow at that!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“It means, your worships' excellencies, that - you - can't come to it! This chicken won't fight. It means that the fat's in the fire, and the cat's out of the bag! It means confusion! Distraction! Perdition! And a tearing off of our wigs! It means the game's up, the play's over, villainy is about to be hanged and virtue about to be married, and the curtain is going to drop and the principal performer - that's I - is going to be called out amid the applause of the audience!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“You don't like this quite country life?" inquired Mrs. Condiment.
"No; no better than I do a quiet country grave-yard. I don't want to return to dust before my time, I tell you," said Cap, yawning dismally over her work.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Go! Go! Go! Go!' said that officer, with an expression as though he considered our Cap an individual of the animal kingdom whom neither Buffon nor any other natural philosopher had ever classified, and who, as a creature of unknown habits, might sometimes be dangerous.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“And no sooner had Cap been commanded, if she valued her safety, not to cross the water or climb the precipice than, as a natural consequence, she began to wonder what was in the valley behind the mountain and what might be in the woods across the river. And she longed, above all things, to explore and find out for herself.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Big streams from little fountains flow. Great oaks from little acorns grow;”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Honor bright! Fair play is a jewel!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“The stirring incidents of the last few months had spoiled her; the monotony of the last few weeks had bored her; and now she had just rode out in quest of adventures.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“This is a jolly imprudent adventure!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“What the foul fiend is the meaning of all this?”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

Gentle admonition." "Gentle admonition! Do you call that gentle admonition? Why, uncle, you are enough to frighten most people to death with your fury. You are a perfect dragon! a griffin! a Russian bear! a Bengal tiger! a Numidian lion! You're all Barnum's beasts in one! I declare, if I don't write and ask him to send a party down here to catch you for his museum!

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“It means that you two, precious father and son, would be a pair of knaves if you had sense enough; but, failing in that, you are only a pair of fools!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“I begin to think a body may get any reasonable thing in this world if they will only try hard enough for it!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“The unregenerate human heart is, perhaps,the most inconsistent thing in all nature; and in nothing is it more capricious than in the manifestations of its passions; and in no passion is it so fantastic as in that which it miscalls love, but which is really often only appetite.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Sarcastic and merciless one, you glory in the pain you give!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

He shall bite the dust!

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Ah! The transitory joy of the past week had been but the lightning's arrowy course scathing where it illumined!”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Lad, there are other starvations besides the total lack of food. There are slow starvations and divers ones. - Doctor Day”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“Great self-respect is as often manifested in forbearance as in resentment.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

The mother smiled at his earnestness - smiled without the least misgiving; for, to her apprehension, the youth was still a boy, to wonder at and admire beauty, without being in the least danger of having his peace of mind disturbed by love.

— E.D.E.N. Southworth

“There is not such a man as the doctor appears in this world more than once in a hundred years.”

— E.D.E.N. Southworth