Middlemarch

Little as Catherine was in the habit of judging for her self, and unfixed as were her general notions of what men ought to be, she could not entirely repress a doubt, while she bore with the effusions of his endless conceit, of his being altogether completely agreeable.

Mary’s doubts stemmed from her deep reservations about the ability of human beings to improve themselves or the world. Evil, she felt, was lodged too deeply inside the human heart. Even those men who appeared to have the highest possible aims—truth, knowledge, liberty—seemed to her to be motivated by the desire for power and recognition, an insight

Each, indeed, secretly wondered what James could see in any one so showy and dashing as Sibyl. But they were too discreet to admit this, even one to the other, and contented themselves with politely wondering what Sibyl could see in such a country sobersides as James.

Her companion’s discourse now sunk from its hitherto animated pitch, to nothing more than a short decisive sentence of praise or condemnation on the face of every woman they met; and Catherine, after listening and agreeing as long as she could, with all the civility and deference of the youthful female mind, fearful of hazarding an opinion of its o