Samuel Richardson quotes

Samuel Richardson was an English writer and printer, renowned for his pioneering work in the development of the English novel. His epistolary novels, such as "Pamela" and "Clarissa," had a profound influence on narrative fiction. He is credited with introducing psychological depth and moral complexity to the form of the novel. Here are 95 of his quotes:

The pleasures of the mighty are obtained by the tears of the poor.

Samuel Richardson

Vast is the field of Science. The more a man knows, the more he will find he has to know.

Samuel Richardson

Those who will bear much, shall have much to bear.

Samuel Richardson

There hardly can be a greater difference between any two men, than there too often is, between the same man, a lover and a husband.

Samuel Richardson

The World, thinking itself affronted by superior merit, takes delight to bring it down to its own level.

Samuel Richardson

O! what a Godlike Power is that of doing Good! I envy the Rich and the Great for nothing else!

Samuel Richardson

The mind can be but full. It will be as much filled with a small disagreeable occurrence, having no other, as with a large one.

Samuel Richardson

Women are so much in love with compliments that rather than want them, they will compliment one another, yet mean no more by it than the men do.

Samuel Richardson

Those who have least to do are generally the most busy people in the world.

Samuel Richardson

I know not my own heart if it be not absolutely free.

Samuel Richardson

People of little understanding are most apt to be angry when their sense is called into question.

Samuel Richardson

Men will bear many things from a kept mistress, which they would not bear from a wife.

Samuel Richardson

A beautiful woman must expect to be more accountable for her steps, than one less attractive.

Samuel Richardson

Where words are restrained, the eyes often talk a great deal.

Samuel Richardson

Necessity may well be called the mother of invention but calamity is the test of integrity.

Samuel Richardson

Tired of myself longing for what I have not.

Samuel Richardson

A feeling heart is a blessing that no one, who has it, would be without; and it is a moral security of innocence; since the heart that is able to partake of the distress of another, cannot wilfully give it.

Samuel Richardson

Of what violences, murders, depredations, have not the epic poets, from all antiquity, been the occasion, by propagating false honour, false glory, and false religion?

Samuel Richardson

I am forced, as I have often said, to try to make myself laugh, that I may not cry: for one or other I must do.

Samuel Richardson

My Master said, on another Occasion, that those who doubt most, always erred least.

Samuel Richardson

That dangerous but too commonly received notion, that a reformed rake makes the best husband.

Samuel Richardson

Air and manners are more expressive than words.

Samuel Richardson