E. Nesbit Quotes

“Real life is often something like books.”

“everything has an end, and you get to it if you only keep all on.”

“If I were writing the book, I might make mistakes. But God knows how to make the story end just right... in the way that’s best for us.”

“Girls are just as clever as boys, and don’t you forget it.”

“She had the power of silent sympathy. That sounds rather dull, I know, but it’s not so dull as it sounds. It just means that a person is able to know that you are unhappy, and to love you extra on that account, without bothering you by telling you all the time how sorry she is for you.”

“I think everyone in the world is friends if you can only get them to see you don’t want to be un-friends.”

“Don’t ask me no questions and I won’t tell you no lies.”

“Roberta was the eldest. Of course, Mother’s never have favourites, but if their Mother HAD had a favourite, it might have been Roberta.”

″...it’s not so much what you do, as what you mean.”

″‘I suppose I shall HAVE to be married some day,’ said Peter, ‘but it will be an awful bother having her round all the time. I’d like to marry a lady who had trances, and only woke up once or twice a year.”

“They also had a Father who was just perfect—never cross, never unjust, and always ready for a game—at least, if at any time he was NOT ready, he always had an excellent reason for it, and explained the reason to the children so interestingly and funnily that they felt sure he couldn’t help himself.”

“I’ll tell you what. We must go and seek for treasure; it is always what you do to restore the fallen fortunes of your house.”

“People think six is a great many, when it’s children. I mean they don’t mind six pairs of boots, or six pounds of apples, or six oranges, especially in equations, but they seem to think that you ought not to have five brothers and sisters.”

″...it is wrong to be angry with people for not being so clever as you are yourself.”

“If what we have written brings happiness to any sad heart we shall not have laboured in vain.”

“Albert’s uncle says I ought to have put this in the preface, but I never read prefaces, and it is not much good writing things just for people to skip.”

“So the fairy godmother- (I’m very sorry, but there’s no room to make the chapters any longer.)”

“You can’t do half the things yourself that children in books do, making models or so on. I wonder why?”

“Peppermint is a great help with arithmetic.”