Thomas Hughes quotes

Thomas Hughes was an English lawyer, judge, and author, best known for writing the novel "Tom Brown's School Days." His work had a significant impact on the development of children's literature and the public school ethos in Victorian England. He is also remembered for his efforts in social reform and as a champion of Christian socialism. Here are 16 of his quotes:

There's always a voice saying the right thing to you somewhere, if you'll only listen for it.

Thomas Hughes

From behind the shadow of the still small voice - more awful than tempest or earthquake - more sure and persistent than day and night - is always sounding full of hope and strength to the weariest of us all, "Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

Thomas Hughes

Christ's whole life on earth was the assertion and example of true manliness - the setting forth in living act and word what man is meant to be, and how he should carry himself in this world of God - one long campaign in which the "temptation" stands out as the first great battle and victory.

Thomas Hughes

Heaven, they say, protects children, sailors, and drunken men; and whatever answers to Heaven in the academical system protects freshmen.

Thomas Hughes

[I]n this life-long fight, to be waged by everyone of us as single-handed against a host of foes, the last requisite for a good fight, the last proof and test of our courage and manfulness, must be loyalty to truth - the most rare and difficult of all human qualities. For such loyalty, as it grows in perfection, asks ever more and more of us, and sets before us a standard of manliness always rising higher and higher.

Thomas Hughes

For the credit of muscular Christianity, one must say that it was not her weight, but the tumult in his own inner man, which made her bearer totter. Nevertheless, if one is wholly unused to the exercise, the carrying a healthy young English girl weighing a good eight stone, is as much as most men can conveniently manage.

Thomas Hughes

It was because you were out of sorts with the world, smarting with the wrongs you saw on every side, struggling after something better and higher and sympathizing with the poor and weak, that I loved you. We should never have been here, dear, if you had been a young gentleman satisfied with himself and the world, and likely to get on well in society.

Thomas Hughes

Women, to be very attractive to all sorts of different people, must have great readiness of sympathy. Many have it naturally, and many work hard in acquiring a good imitation of it. In the first case it is against the nature of such persons to be monopolized for more than a very short time; in the second all their trouble would be thrown away if they allowed themselves to be monopolized. Once in their lives, indeed, they will be, and ought to be, and that monopoly lasts, or should last for ever; but instead of destroying in them that which was their great charm, it only deepens and widens it, and the sympathy which was before fitful, and, perhaps, wayward, flows on in a calm and healthy stream, blessing and cheering all who come within reach of its exhilarating and life-giving waters.

Thomas Hughes

[W]hat will not a delicately nurtured British lady go through when her mind is bent either on pleasure or duty?

Thomas Hughes

The consciousness of the darkness in one and around one brings the longing for light. And then the light dawns; through mist and fog, perhaps, but enough to pick one's way by." He stopped a moment and then added, "and shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.

Thomas Hughes

[T]he least of the muscular Christians has hold of the old chivalrous and Christian belief, that a man's body is given him to be trained and brought into subjection, and then used for the protection of the weak, the advancement of all righteous causes, and the subduing of the earth which God has given to the children of men. He does not hold that mere strength or activity are in themselves worthy of any respect or worship, or that one man is a bit better than another because he can knock him down or carry a bigger sack of potatoes than he.

Thomas Hughes

He never wants anything but what's right and fair; only when you come to settle what's right and fair, it's everything that he wants and nothing that you want. And that's his idea of a compromise.

Thomas Hughes

Life isn't all beer and skittles, but beer and skittles, or something better of the same sort, must form a good part of every Englishman's education.

Thomas Hughes

It's more than a game. It's an institution.

Thomas Hughes