During the present interval between the feudal age and the coming time, when life and its occupations will be freely thrown open to women as to men, the condition of the female working classes is such that if its sufferings were but made known, emotions of horror and shame would tremble through the whole of society. — of the wants, wishes, and ideas of every class or coterie of society that can speak for itself, and of some that cannot !”, “Are we not growing sensibly more merciful, more wisely humane towards empirics themselves, when they cease to be our oracles ?

The bystanders can never fully understand this suffering ; no, though they may themselves have suffered to extremity.”, “The truth is, as all will declare who are subject to a frequently recurring pain, a familiar pain becomes more and more dreaded, instead of becoming lightly esteemed in proportion to its familiarity.
How my spirits rose in a moment at this recognition of the truth !”, “The weakest sufferers are precisely those who are least able to appropriate the future and its good things. “Society in America”, p.178, Harriet Martineau (1837).

This noble word [women], spirit-stirring as it passes over English ears, is in America banished, and 'ladies' and 'females' substituted: the one to English taste mawkish and vulgar; the other indistinctive and gross. The constellations formed in the human soul, out of the chaos of pain, must have a duration compared with which, those of the firmament are but as the sparkles showered over the sea by the rising sun. Laws and customs may be creative of vice; and should be therefore perpetually under process of observation and correction: but laws and customs cannot be creative of virtue: they may encourage and help to preserve it; but they cannot originate it. “What office is there which involves more responsibility, which requires more qualifications, and … If a test of civilization be sought, none can be so sure as the condition of that half of society over which the other half has power. All women should inform themselves of the condition of their sex and of their own position. Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

For my own part, I had rather suffer any inconvenience from having to work occasionally in chambers and kitchen... than witness the subservience in which the menial class is held in Europe. If this be true of the weak, and if the strong find it irritating to be medicined with soft fictions, or presented with anything but sound truth, the popular method of consolation appears to be excluded altogether. “Society in America”, p.179, Harriet Martineau (1837). My own feeling of concern arises from seeing how much moral injury and suffering is created by the superstitions of the Christian mythology. Women, like men, must be educated with a view to action, or their studies cannot be called education. Moral essays. I: Abridged, Annotated)”, p.85, BIG BYTE BOOKS, Harriet Martineau (1836). – Harriet Martineau. A soul preoccupied with great ideas best performs small duties.
Every one has felt this, in regard to some one proverb, or divine scriptural clause, or word of some right royal philosopher or poet. “Society in America”, p.147, Harriet Martineau (2004). It is to be hoped that the privacy of viva voce conversation will ever remain sacred : but it is known that that which ought to be as holy, that of epistolary correspondence, — (the private conversation of distant friends) is constantly and deliberately violated, where there are certain inducements to do so.”, “If I were asked whether there is any one idea more potential than any other over every sort of suffering, in a mode of life like ours, most hearers of the question would make haste to answer for me that there is such a variety of potential ideas, suited to such wide differences of mood, of mind and body, that it must be impossible to measure the strength of any one. The freedom is itself a positive and never-failing enjoyment to me, after the bondage of my early life.

Essays on the art of thinking. I: Abridged, Annotated)”, p.29, BIG BYTE BOOKS, Harriet Martineau (1837). A soul occupied with great ideas performs small duties. What will become of me?" If so, what is the ground of this limitation? “Society in America”, p.163, There is a mistake in the text of this quote. I never did a right thing or abstained from a wrong one from any consideration of reward or punishment. Harriet Martineau It is characteristic of genius to be hopeful and aspiring. — Harriet Martineau “ My business in life has been to think and learn, and to speak out with absolute freedom what I have thought and learned. If it be so, let the modesty succumb. “Society in America”, p.176, Harriet Martineau (1837). It is hard to tell which is worse; the wide diffusion of things that are not true, or the suppression of … Rate it: You better live your best and act your best and ... Citation. If there is any country on earth where the course of true love may be expected to run smooth, it is America. It is when death is not to be looked for, nor yet health, that the test is applied ; that, on either hand, the genius and the awkwardness of consolation present themselves, with a vast gradation between these extremes. Essays on the art of thinking. ... Our care, then, should be to look to our principles, and to avoid all anxiety about our emotions. 19 Harriet Martineau Quotes - BrainyQuote. Marriage ... is still the imperfect institution it must remain while women continue to be ill-educated, passive, and subservient. “Philosophical essays. “Happiness consists in the full employment of our faculties in some pursuit.”, “[Americans] have realized many things for which the rest of the world is still struggling...[yet] the civilization and the morals of the Americans fall far below their own principles.”, “Biography will never fail. The progression of emancipation of any class usually, if not always, takes place through the efforts of individuals of that class. Surely we both believe that all truth and goodness are destined to arise sooner or later among men. It can be only a false modesty which can be thus endangered. what a heavenly solace to the soul is free sympathy in its hour of need !”, “Far different was my emotion, when one said to me, with a face like the face of an angel, '' Why should we be bent upon your being better, and make up a bright prospect for you ?

Genius is therefore essentially democratic, and has always been so. Never”, We’d love your help.

To one still in this chaos, — if he do but see the creative process advancing, — it can be no reasonable matter of complaint, that his course is laid the while through such a region ; and he will feel almost ashamed of even the most passing anxiety as to how soon he may be permitted to emerge.”, “In a sharp sickness of a few days or weeks, all good and kind people act and speak much alike; are busy and ingenious in hastening the recovery, and providing relief meantime.