Mary Wollstonecraft Quotes

I will be cool, persevering, and prudent.

You are still, as you ever were, lovely, beautiful beyond expression.

Was man, indeed, at once so powerful, so virtuous and magnificent, yet so vicious and base? He appeared at one time a mere scion of the evil principle and at another as all that can be conceived of noble and godlike. To be a great and virtuous man appeared the highest honour that can befall a sensitive being; to be base and vicious, as many on record have been, appeared the lowest degradation, a condition more abject than that of the blind mole or harmless worm. For a long time I could not conceive how one man could go forth to murder his fellow, or even why there were laws and governments; but when I heard details of vice and bloodshed, my wonder ceased and I turned away with disgust and loathing.

A miserable spectacle of wrecked humanity, pitiable to others and intolerable to myself.

Here then I retreated, and lay down, happy to have found a shelter, however miserable, from the inclemency of the season, and still more from the barbarity of man.

Soon a gentle light stole over the heavens, and gave me a sensation of pleasure. I started up, and beheld a radiant form rise from among the trees.* I gazed with a kind of wonder. It moved slowly, but it enlightened my path ; and I again went out. * The moon.

We cannot without depraving our minds endeavour to please a lover or husband but in proportion as he pleases us.

Who could be interested in the fate of a murderer, but the hangman who would gain his fee?

To be a good mother — a woman must have sense, and that independence of mind which few women possess who are taught to depend entirely on their husbands. Meek wives are, in general, foolish mothers; wanting their children to love them best, and take their part, in secret, against the father, who is held up as a scarecrow.

The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature.

Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties only dissoluble by the annhilation of one of us.

He is dead who called me into being, and when I shall be no more the very remembrance of us both will speedily vanish.

...take me where I may forget myself, my existence, and all the world.

I will tell my story, and my reader shall judge for me. I will tell my story, and so contrive to pass some few hours of a long eternity, become so worrisome to me.

You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been. - Victor Frankenstein.