Wuthering Heights quotes

This is certainly a beautiful country! In all England, I do not believe that I could have fixed on a situation so completely removed from the stir of society.

A perfect misanthropist’s heaven: and Mr. Heathcliff and I are such a suitable pair to divide the desolation between us.

A capital fellow!

The “walk in” was uttered with closed teeth, and expressed the sentiment, “Go to the Deuce”: even the gate over which he leant manifested no sympathising movement to the words; and I think that circumstance determined me to accept the invitation:

I felt interested in a man who seemed more exaggeratedly reserved than myself.

When he saw my horse’s breast fairly pushing the barrier, he did put out his hand to unchain it, and then sullenly preceded me up the causeway, calling, as we entered the court—“Joseph, take Mr. Lockwood’s horse; and bring up some wine.”

I have a sympathetic chord within that tells me it is nothing of the sort: I know, by instinct, his reserve springs from an aversion to showy displays of feeling—to manifestations of mutual kindliness.

He’ll love and hate equally under cover, and esteem it a species of impertinence to be loved or hated again.

No, I’m running on too fast: I bestow my own attributes over-liberally on him. Mr. Heathcliff may have entirely dissimilar reasons for keeping his hand out of the way when he meets a would-be acquaintance, to those which actuate me.

“Come, come,” he said, “you are flurried, Mr. Lockwood. Here, take a little wine.

Guests are so exceedingly rare in this house that I and my dogs, I am willing to own, hardly know how to receive them.

Your health, sir?”

I found him very intelligent on the topics we touched; and before I went home, I was encouraged so far as to volunteer another visit tomorrow. He evidently wished no repetition of my intrusion. I shall go, notwithstanding.

It is astonishing how sociable I feel myself compared with him.

Here is the consequence of being buried alive: she has thrown herself away upon that boor from sheer ignorance that better individuals existed! A sad pity—I must beware how I cause her to regret her choice.” The last reflection may seem conceited; it was not.

My neighbour struck me as bordering on repulsive; I knew, through experience, that I was tolerably attractive.

“Mrs. Heathcliff is my daughter-in-law,” said Heathcliff, corroborating my surmise. He turned, as he spoke, a peculiar look in her direction: a look of hatred;

What vain weathercocks we are!

I, who had determined to hold myself independent of all social intercourse, and thanked my stars that, at length, I had lighted on a spot where it was next to impracticable—I, weak wretch, after maintaining till dusk a struggle with low spirits and solitude, was …

but he’s very near—close-handed; and, if he had meant to flit to Thrushcross Grange, as soon as he heard of a good tenant he could not have borne to miss the chance of getting a few hundreds more.

It is strange people should be so greedy, when they are alone in the world!

”

“

Rough as a saw-edge, and hard as whinstone! The less you meddle with him the better.

”

“Yes: you had the reason of going to bed with a proud heart and an empty stomach,” said I. “

Proud people breed sad sorrows for themselves.

But, if you be ashamed of your touchiness, you must ask pardon, mind, when she comes in. You must go up and offer to kiss her, and say—you know best what to say;

Wish and learn to smooth away the surly wrinkles, to raise your lids frankly, and change the fiends to confident, innocent angels, suspecting and doubting nothing, and always seeing friends where they are not sure of foes.

Don’t get the expression of a vicious cur that appears to know the kicks it gets are its dessert, and yet hates all the world, as well as the kicker, for what it suffers.

”

“And so do I.

I’ve dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas: they’ve gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.

And this is one: I’m going to tell it—but take care not to smile at any part of it.”

“

If I were in heaven, Nelly, I should be extremely miserable.

”

It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am.

Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton’s is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.

”

time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.

Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being.

So don’t talk of our separation again: it is impracticable; and—”

What were the use of my creation, if I were entirely contained here? My great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff’s miseries, and I watched and felt each from the beginning: my great thought in living is himself.

If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it.

—My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary. Nelly, I am Heathcliff!

my great thought in living is himself. If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it.—

My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I’m well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary.

Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure, any more than I am always a pleasure to myself, but as my own being. So don’t talk of our separation again: it is impracticable; and—”

not from affection, but from pride: he wished earnestly to see her bring honour to the family by an alliance with the Lintons, and as long as she let him alone she might trample on us like slaves, for aught he cared!

Edgar Linton, as multitudes have been before and will be after him, was infatuated

: and believed himself the happiest man alive on the day he led her to Gimmerton Chapel, three years subsequent to his father’s death.

A charming introduction to a hermit’s life! Four weeks’ torture, tossing, and sickness!

Oh, these bleak winds and bitter northern skies, and impassable roads, and dilatory country surgeons! And oh, this dearth of the human physiognomy! and, worse than all, the terrible intimation of Kenneth that I need not expect to be out of doors till spring!

and, to my agreeable disappointment, she behaved infinitely better than I dared to expect. She seemed almost overfond of Mr. Linton; and even to his sister she showed plenty of affection. They were both very attentive to her comfort, certainly.

It was not the thorn bending to the honeysuckles, but the honeysuckles embracing the thorn.

There were no mutual concessions: one stood erect, and the others yielded: and who can be ill-natured and bad-tempered when they encounter neither opposition nor indifference? I observed that Mr. Edgar had a deep-rooted fear of ruffling her humour. He concealed it from her;

It ended.

Well, we must be for ourselves in the long run; the mild and generous are only more justly selfish than the domineering;

and it ended when circumstances caused each to feel that the one’s interest was not the chief consideration in the other’s thoughts. On a mellow evening in September, I was coming from the garden with a heavy basket of apples which I had been gathering.

Your welcome has put these ideas out of my mind; but beware of meeting me with another aspect next time! Nay, you’ll not drive me off again. You were really sorry for me, were you? Well, there was cause.

I’ve fought through a bitter life since I last heard your voice; and you must forgive me, for I struggled only for you!

”

“I wouldn’t be you for a kingdom, then!” Catherine declared, emphatically: and she seemed to speak sincerely. “Nelly, help me to convince her of her madness.

Tell her what Heathcliff is: an unreclaimed creature, without refinement, without cultivation; an arid wilderness of furze and whinstone.

I’d as soon put that little canary into the park on a winter’s day, as recommend you to bestow your heart on him! It is deplorable ignorance of his character, child, and nothing else, which makes that dream enter your head.

they crush those beneath them. You are welcome to torture me to death for your amusement, only allow me to amuse myself a little in the same style, and refrain from insult as much as you are able.

Having levelled my palace, don’t erect a hovel and complacently admire your own charity in giving me that for a home.

If I imagined you really wished me to marry Isabel, I’d cut my throat!”

“

Cathy, this lamb of yours threatens like a bull!

” he said. “It is in danger of splitting its skull against my knuckles. By God! Mr. Linton, I’m mortally sorry that you are not worth knocking down!”

without any anger in his voice, but with much sorrowful despondency. “I shall not stay. I am neither come to wrangle nor be reconciled; but I wish just to learn whether, after this evening’s events, you intend to continue your intimacy with—”

“Oh, for mercy’s sake,” interrupted the mistress, stamping her foot, “for mercy’s sake, let us hear no more of it now! Your cold blood cannot be worked into a fever: your veins are full of ice-water; but mine are boiling, and the sight of such chillness makes them dance.”

“To get rid of me, answer my question,” persevered Mr. Linton. “You must answer it; and that violence does not alarm me. I have found that you can be as stoical as anyone, when you please.

“If I were only sure it would kill him,” she interrupted, “I’d kill myself directly! These three awful nights I’ve never closed my lids—and oh, I’ve been tormented! I’ve been haunted, Nelly! But I begin to fancy you don’t like me. How strange!

I thought, though everybody hated and despised each other, they could not avoid loving me.

And they have all turned to enemies in a few hours: they have, I’m positive; the people here. How dreary to meet death, surrounded by their cold faces!

And Edgar standing solemnly by to see it over; then offering prayers of thanks to God for restoring peace to his house, and going back to his books!

What in the name of all that feels has he to do with books, when I am dying?

”

Shake your head as you will, Nelly, you have helped to unsettle me! You should have spoken to Edgar, indeed you should, and compelled him to leave me quiet! Oh, I’m burning! I wish I were out of doors!

I wish I were a girl again, half savage and hardy, and free; and laughing at injuries, not maddening under them!

Why am I so changed? why does my blood rush into a hell of tumult at a few words? I’m sure I should be myself were I once among the heather on those hills. Open the window again wide: fasten it open!

We’ve braved its ghosts often together, and dared each other to stand among the graves and ask them to come. But, Heathcliff, if I dare you now, will you venture? If you do, I’ll keep you.

I’ll not lie there by myself: they may bury me twelve feet deep, and throw the church down over me, but I won’t rest till you are with me.

I never will!”

Two words would comprehend my future—death and hell: existence, after losing her, would be hell. Yet I was a fool to fancy for a moment that she valued Edgar Linton’s attachment more than mine.

If he loved with all the powers of his puny being, he couldn’t love as much in eighty years as I could in a day.

And Catherine has a heart as deep as I have: the sea could be as readily contained in that horse-trough as her whole affection be monopolised by him. Tush! He is scarcely a degree dearer to her than her dog, or her horse.

is that a proof of tranquillity? You talk of her mind being unsettled. How the devil could it be otherwise in her frightful isolation? And that insipid, paltry creature attending her from duty and humanity! From pity and charity!

He might as well plant an oak in a flowerpot, and expect it to thrive, as imagine he can restore her to vigour in the soil of his shallow cares?

Let us settle it at once: will you stay here, and am I to fight my way to Catherine over Linton and his footman? Or will you be my friend, as you have been hitherto, and do what I request? Decide!

And here Isabella began to cry; but, immediately dashing the water from her lashes, she recommenced. “You asked, what has driven me to flight at last? I was compelled to attempt it, because I had succeeded in rousing his rage a pitch above his malignity.

Pulling out the nerves with red hot pincers requires more coolness than knocking on the head.

He was worked up to forget the fiendish prudence he boasted of, and proceeded to murderous violence. I experienced pleasure in being able to exasperate him: the sense of pleasure woke my instinct of self-preservation, so I fairly broke free;

“He’s not a human being,” she retorted; “and he has no claim on my charity.

I gave him my heart, and he took and pinched it to death, and flung it back to me.

People feel with their hearts, Ellen: and since he has destroyed mine, I have not power to feel for him: and I would not, though he groaned from this to his dying day, and wept tears of blood for Catherine! No, indeed, indeed, I wouldn’t!”

‘and that’s a poor love of yours that cannot bear a shower of snow! We were left at peace in our beds as long as the summer moon shone, but the moment a blast of winter returns, you must run for shelter!

Heathcliff, if I were you, I’d go stretch myself over her grave and die like a faithful dog.

The world is surely not worth living in now, is it? You had distinctly impressed on me the idea that Catherine was the whole joy of your life: I can’t imagine how you think of surviving her loss.’

But he was too good to be thoroughly unhappy long. He didn’t pray for Catherine’s soul to haunt him.

Time brought resignation, and a melancholy sweeter than common joy.

He recalled her memory with ardent, tender love, and hopeful aspiring to the better world; where he doubted not she was gone.

and I could not see how they shouldn’t both have taken the same road, for good or evil. But, I thought in my mind, Hindley, with apparently the stronger head, has shown himself sadly the worse and the weaker man.

When his ship struck, the captain abandoned his post; and the crew, instead of trying to save her, rushed into riot and confusion, leaving no hope for their luckless vessel.

Linton, on the contrary, displayed the true courage of a loyal and faithful soul: he trusted God; and God comforted him. One hoped, and the other despaired: they chose their own lots, and were righteously doomed to endure them.

and the crew, instead of trying to save her, rushed into riot and confusion, leaving no hope for their luckless vessel. Linton, on the contrary, displayed the true courage of a loyal and faithful soul: he trusted God; and God comforted him.

One hoped, and the other despaired: they chose their own lots, and were righteously doomed to endure them.

But you’ll not want to hear my moralising, Mr. Lockwood; you’ll judge, as well as I can, all these things: at least, you’ll think you will, and that’s the same. The end of Earnshaw was what might have been expected;

it was just when the people were bearing the coffin from the house. He had the hypocrisy to represent a mourner: and previous to following with Hareton, he lifted the unfortunate child on to the table and muttered, with peculiar gusto,

“Now, my bonny lad, you are mine! And we’ll see if one tree won’t grow as crooked as another, with the same wind to twist it!”

The unsuspecting thing was pleased at this speech: he played with Heathcliff’s whiskers, and stroked his cheek; but I divined its meaning, and observed tartly, “That boy must go back with me to Thrushcross Grange, sir.

“Oh, it will be something worse,” she said. “And what shall I do when papa and you leave me, and I am by myself? I can’t forget your words, Ellen; they are always in my ear.

How life will be changed, how dreary the world will be, when papa and you are dead.

”

“I fret about nothing on earth except papa’s illness,” answered my companion. “I care for nothing in comparison with papa. And I’ll never—never—oh, never, while I have my senses, do an act or say a word to vex him.

I love him better than myself, Ellen; and I know it by this: I pray every night that I may live after him; because I would rather be miserable than that he should be: that proves I love him better than myself.

”

“I can get over the wall,” she said laughing. “

The Grange is not a prison, Ellen, and you are not my gaoler.

And besides, I’m almost seventeen: I’m a woman. And I’m certain Linton would recover quickly if he had me to look after him. I’m older than he is, you know, and wiser: less childish, am I not?

“Oh, Catherine!” I cried, sorrowfully. “You know you have been doing wrong, or you wouldn’t be driven to uttering an untruth to me. That does grieve me.

I’d rather be three months ill, than hear you frame a deliberate lie.

”

but close by great swells of long grass undulating in waves to the breeze; and woods and sounding water, and the whole world awake and wild with joy.

He wanted all to lie in an ecstasy of peace; I wanted all to sparkle and dance in a glorious jubilee.

I said his heaven would be only half alive; and he said mine would be drunk: I said I should fall asleep in his; and he said he could not breathe in mine, and began to grow very snappish.

and woods and sounding water, and the whole world awake and wild with joy. He wanted all to lie in an ecstasy of peace; I wanted all to sparkle and dance in a glorious jubilee.

I said his heaven would be only half alive; and he said mine would be drunk: I said I should fall asleep in his; and he said he could not breathe in mine, and began to grow very snappish.

At last, we agreed to try both, as soon as the right weather came; and then we kissed each other and were friends.

Miss Linton, take your seat by him. I give you what I have: the present is hardly worth accepting; but I have nothing else to offer. It is Linton, I mean. How she does stare!

It’s odd what a savage feeling I have to anything that seems afraid of me! Had I been born where laws are less strict and tastes less dainty, I should treat myself to a slow vivisection of those two, as an evening’s amusement.

”

And it is quite natural that you should desire amusement at your age; and that you would weary of nursing a sick man, and that man only your father.

Catherine, his happiest days were over when your days began.

He cursed you, I dare say, for coming into the world (I did, at least); and it would just do if he cursed you as he went out of it. I’d join him. I don’t love you! How should I? Weep away.

I couldn’t abide to be present at their meeting. I stood outside the chamber-door a quarter of an hour, and hardly ventured near the bed, then.

All was composed, however: Catherine’s despair was as silent as her father’s joy.

She supported him calmly, in appearance; and he fixed on her features his raised eyes that seemed dilating with ecstasy.

They are of no use to you; or else you concealed them in the bad spirit that, as you cannot enjoy them, nobody else shall. Perhaps your envy counselled Mr. Heathcliff to rob me of my treasures?

But I’ve most of them written on my brain and printed in my heart, and you cannot deprive me of those!

”

and I fancied I guessed the incitement to his secret studies also. He had been content with daily labour and rough animal enjoyments, till Catherine crossed his path.

Shame at her scorn, and hope of her approval, were his first prompters to higher pursuits; and instead of guarding him from one and winning him to the other, his endeavours to raise himself had produced just the contrary result.

“Yes; that’s all the good that such a brute as you can get from them!” cried Catherine, sucking her damaged lip, and watching the conflagration with indignant eyes.

“Oh, indeed; you’re tired of being banished from the world, are you?” he said. “But if you be coming to plead off paying for a place you won’t occupy, your journey is useless:

I never relent in exacting my due from anyone.

”

She obeyed his directions very punctually: perhaps she had no temptation to transgress.

Living among clowns and misanthropists, she probably cannot appreciate a better class of people when she meets them.

With Mr. Heathcliff, grim and saturnine, on the one hand, and Hareton, absolutely dumb, on the other, I made a somewhat cheerless meal, and bade adieu early.

It was sweet, warm weather—too warm for travelling; but the heat did not hinder me from enjoying the delightful scenery above and below: had I seen it nearer August, I’m sure it would have tempted me to waste a month among its solitudes.

In winter nothing more dreary, in summer nothing more divine, than those glens shut in by hills, and those bluff, bold swells of heath.

I reached the Grange before sunset, and knocked for admittance; but the family had retreated into the back premises, I judged, by one thin, blue wreath, curling from the kitchen chimney, and they did not hear. I rode into the court.