The Confidence-Man Quotes
American novels
Top Quotes
“Wikipedia: The Confidence-Man”
“Wikisource Author: The Confidence-Man”
“Free eBook of: The Confidence-Man at Project Gutenberg.”
“Well, there is sorrow in the world, but goodness too; and goodness that is not greenness, either, no more than sorrow is.”
“Yes, learn from me that, though the sorrows of the world are great, its wickedness — that is, its ugliness — is small.”
“Yours, sir, if I mistake not, must be a beautiful soul — one full of all love and truth; for where beauty is, there must those be.”
“Online text of the novel at the Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library”
“While religion, contrary to the common notion, implies, in certain cases, a spirit of slow reserve as to assent, infidelity, which claims to despise credulity, is sometimes swift to it.”
“"Help? to say nothing of the friend, there is something wrong about the man who wants help. There is somewhere a defect, a want, in brief, a need, a crying need, somewhere about that man."”
“Tacitus — he is the most extraordinary example of a heretic; not one iota of confidence in his kind. What a mockery that such an one should be reputed wise, and Thucydides be esteemed the statesman's manual!”
“It is one of the imbecilities of the suspicious person to fancy that every stranger, however absent-minded, he sees so much as smiling or gesturing to himself in any odd sort of way, is secretly making him his butt.”
“Admit, as you must, that mankind is not mad, and my project is practicable. For, what creature but a madman would not rather do good than ill, when it is plain that, good or ill, it must return upon himself?”
“With these words and a grand scorn the cosmopolitan turned on his heel, leaving his companion at a loss to determine where exactly the fictitious character had been dropped, and the real one, if any, resumed.”
“In after days, telling the night's adventure to his friends, the worthy barber always spoke of his queer customer as the man-charmer — as certain East Indians are called snake-charmers — and all his friends united in thinking him QUITE AN ORIGINAL.”
“I myself have known adversity, and know it still. But for that, do I turn cynic? No, no: it is small beer that sours. To my fellow-creatures I owe alleviations. So, whatever I may have undergone, it but deepens my confidence in my kind.”
“Critical reaction to and a publishing history of The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade from The Life and Works of Herman Melville”
“Goneril held it flattery to hint praise even of the absent, and even if merited; but honesty, to fling people's imputed faults into their faces. This was thought malice, but it certainly was not passion. Passion is human.”
“The next moment, the waning light expired, and with it the waning flames of the horned altar, and the waning halo round the robed man's brow; while in the darkness which ensued, the cosmopolitan kindly led the old man away. Something further may follow of this Masquerade.”
“"Then, good-night, good-night; and Providence have both of us in its good keeping."
"Be sure it will," eying the old man with sympathy, as for the moment he stood, money-belt in hand, and life-preserver under arm, "be sure it will, sir, since in Providence, as in man, you and I equally put trust.”