Charles Dickens

Are not the sane and the insane equal at night as the sane lie a dreaming?

have you taken leave of your senses

Oliver has long since grown stout and healthy; but health or sickness made no difference in his warm feelings to those about him, though they do in the feelings of a great many people. He was still the same gentle, attached, affectionate creature that he had been when pain and suffering had wasted his strength; and when he was dependent for every slight attention and comfort on those who tended him.

Then it is your opinion_that a man should never-_-Invest in portable property in a friend?__ __ertainly he should not. Unless he wants to get rid of the friend- and then it becomes a question how much portable property it may be worth to get rid of him.

My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest.

Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts.

...and to-morrow looked in my face more steadily than I could look at it

Reflect upon your present blessings -- of which every man has many -- not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.

Make them laugh, make them cry, make them wait.

There never were greed and cunning in the world yet, that did not do too much, and overreach themselves. It is as certain as death.

I am no more annoyed when I think of the expression, than I should be annoyed by a man's opinion of a picture of mine, who had no eye for pictures; or of a piece of music of mine, who had no ear for music.

The society of girls is a very delightful thing, Copperfield. It's not professional, but it's very delightful.

Perhaps second-hand cares, like second-hand clothes, come easily off and on.

I should like to ask you: -- Does your childhood seem far off? Do the days when you sat at your mother's knee, seem days of very long ago?" Responding to his softened manner, Mr. Lorry answered: "Twenty years back, yes; at this time of my life, no. For, as I draw closer and closer to the end, I travel in the circle, nearer and nearer to the beginning. It seems to be one of the kind smoothings and preparings of the way. My heart is touched now, by many remembrances that had long fallen asleep, of my pretty young mother (and I so old!), and by many associations of the days when what we call the World was not so real with me, and my faults were not confirmed with me.

It is a dreadful thing to wait and watch for the approach of death; to know that hope is gone, and recovery impossible; and to sit and count the dreary hours through long, long, nights - such nights as only watchers by the bed of sickness know. It chills the blood to hear the dearest secrets of the heart, the pent-up, hidden secrets of many years, poured forth by the unconscious helpless being before you; and to think how little the reserve, and cunning of a whole life will avail, when fever and delirium tear off the mask at last. Strange tales have been told in the wanderings of dying men; tales so full of guilt and crime, that those who stood by the sick person's couch have fled in horror and affright, lest they should be scared to madness by what they heard and saw; and many a wretch has died alone, raving of deeds, the very name of which, has driven the boldest man away.("The Drunkard's Death")

So may the New Year be a happy one to you, happy to many more whose happiness depends on you!

[S]he stood for some moments gazing at the sisters, with affection beaming in one eye, and calculation shining out of the other.

And this is the eternal law. For, Evil often stops short at istelf and dies with the doer of it! but Good, never.