"When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of, but our severity."

Forgiveness

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Insight & Reflection

The theme of forgiveness is universal, yet George Eliot manages to capture its essence in a uniquely profound way. Taking a moment to internalize this can shift our mindset, reminding us that our perspective on forgiveness often shapes our reality.

About George Eliot

Mary Ann Evans, known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wrote seven novels: Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Romola (1862–1863), Felix Holt, the Radical (1866), Middlemarch (1871–1872) and Daniel Deronda (1876). Her novels are known for their realism, psychological insight, sense of place, and detailed depiction of the countryside. Middlemarch was described by the novelist Virginia Woolf as "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people" and by Martin Amis and Julian Barnes as the greatest novel in the English language.

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Editorial Note: This quote is curated and fact-checked by the ShortQuote Editorial Team. Verified Literature Specialist.

More by George Eliot

"No story is the same to us after a lapse of time or rather we who read it are no longer the same interpreters."

— George Eliot
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"The beginning of compunction is the beginning of a new life."

— George Eliot
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"The world is full of hopeful analogies and handsome, dubious eggs, called possibilities."

— George Eliot
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"It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are thoroughly alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger after them."

— George Eliot
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More about Forgiveness

"The sanitary and mechanical age we are now entering makes up for the mercy it grants to our sense of smell by the ferocity with which it assails our sense of hearing."

— Havelock Ellis
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"I know there is a Supreme Being who rules the affairs of men and whose goodness and mercy have always followed the American people, and I know He will not turn from us now if we humbly and reverently seek His powerful aid."

— Grover Cleveland
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"One can't relive one's life. Forgiveness is not what's difficult one's always too ready to forgive. And it does no good, that's obvious."

— Louis-Ferdinand Celine
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"Being a woman is of special interest only to aspiring male transsexuals. To actual women, it is simply a good excuse not to play football."

— Fran Lebowitz
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