Quotes from Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

a thousand fanged thoughts stung me to the heart.

Yet why were these gentle beings unhappy? They possessed a delightful house (for such it was in my eyes) and every luxury; they had a fire to warm them when chill, and delicious viands when hungry; they were dressed in excellent clothes; and, still more, they enjoyed one another's company and speech, interchanging each day looks of affection and kindness.

Sometimes I have endeavoured to discover what quality it is which he possesses that elevates him so immeasurably above any other person I ever knew. I believe it to be an intuitive discernment, a quick but never-failing power of judgment, a penetration into the causes of things, unequalled for clearness and precision; add to this a facility of expression and a voice whose varied intonations are soul-subduing music.

Invention consists in the capacity of seizing on the capabilities of a subject, and in the power of moulding and fashioning ideas suggested to it.

Frightful the storm which embraced the gallant vessel on its course and wrecked it-thus!

I expected this reception,' said the daemon. 'All men hate the wretched; how, then, must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things! Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annihilation of one of us. You purpose to kill me. How dare you sport thus with life?

Nothing is more painful to the human mind than, after the feelings have been worked up by a quick succession of events, the dead calmness of inaction and certainty which follows and deprives the soul of both hope and fear

Seek happiness in tranquility and avoid ambition, even if it be only the apparently innocent one of distinguishing yourself in science and discoveries.

Everywhere i see bliss, from which i alone am irrevocably excluded.

It is so long before the mind can persuade itself that she whom we saw every day and whose very existence appeared a part of our own can have departed forever—that the brightness of a be- loved eye can have been extinguished and the sound of a voice so familiar and dear to the ear can be hushed, never more to be heard.

all joy was but a mockery which insulted my desolate state and made me feel more painfully that I was not made for the enjoyment of pleasure.

But power, in all its shapes, is venerable to man. Awe, curiosity, a clinging fascination, drew me towards him.

And to my young heart the idea of death came for the first time blended with that of joy.

The words induced me to turn towards myself. I learned that the possessions most esteemed by your fellow creatures were high and unsullied descent united with riches. A man might be respected with only one of these advantages, but without either he was considered, except in very rare instances. as a vagabond and a slave, doomed to waste his powers for the profits of the chosen few!

You have suffered a land-, I a sea-wreck.

sorrow only increased with knowledge. Oh, that I had forever remained in my native wood, nor known or felt beyond the sensations of hunger, thirst, and heat!

Si el éxito me sonríe pasarán muchos, muchos meses, y tal vez años, antes de que volvamos a encontrarnos. Si fracaso, me verás pronto, o quizá nunca.

We rest; a dream has power to poison sleep. We rise; one wand'ring thought pollutes the day. We feel, concieve, or reason; laugh or weep, Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away; It is the same: for, be it joy or sorrow, The path of its departure still is free. Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow; Nought may endure but mutability!

Was my dream but a mirror of the truth?

Nuestras almas están formadas de muy extraña manera y nuestras vidas penden sólo de leves lazos, cuya rotura, puede arrojarlas a la prosperidad o a la ruina.

Llega por fin el dái en que la pena es más un alivio que una necesidad y que la sonrisa, aunque juzgada casi un sacrilegio, puede afluir los labios. Mi madre había muerto [...]

se desvanecía la belleza de mi sueño y el corazón se me llenaba de horror y disgusto.

And now, once again, I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper. I have an affection for it, for it was the offspring of happy days, when death and grief were but words, which found no true echo in my heart. Its several pages speak of many a walk, many a drive, and many a conversation, when I was not alone; and my companion was one who, in this world, I shall never see more. But this is for myself; my readers have nothing to do with these associations.

Na verdade, quando busco as origens da minha obsessão, que veio depois a reger o meu destino, descubro que ela brotou, como um rio na montanha, de um fio de água remoto e quase esquecido, que foi-se avolumando pouco a pouco, até converter-se na torrente que arrastou em seu curso todas as minhas esperanças e alegrias.