The law is a gun, which if it misses a pigeon always kills a crow; if it does not strike the guilty, it hits someone else. As every crime creates a law, so in turn every law creates a crime.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
No author ever drew a character consistent to human nature, but he was forced to ascribe to it many inconsistencies.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the inherent complexities and contradictions of human nature as observed by authors in their characters.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton suggests that any author attempting to create a character that truly reflects human nature will encounter the challenge of incorporating various inconsistencies. This reflects the complexities of people, as individuals often display conflicting traits and behaviors, making it difficult to portray them in a way that is wholly consistent or accurate.
Themes
Human NatureInconsistencyCharacterLiteraturePhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
In a literature class discussion about character development, this quote provides insight into the challenges authors face.
More from Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron Lytton
All quotes βThe best teacher is the one who suggests rather than dogmatizes, and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
There are two lives to each of us, the life of our actions, and the life of our minds and hearts. History reveals men's deeds and their outward characters, but not themselves. There is a secret self that has its own life, unpenetrated and unguessed.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
A chord, stronger or weaker, is snapped asunder in every parting, and time's busy fingers are not practiced in re-splicing broken ties. Meet again you may; will it be in the same way? With the same sympathies? With the same sentiments? Will the souls, hurrying on in diverse paths, unite once more, as if the interval had been a dream? Rarely, rarely!
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
Revenge is a common passion; it is the sin of the uninstructed. The savage deems it noble;but the religion of Christ, which is the sublime civilizer, emphatically condemns it. Why? Because religion ever seeks to ennoble man; and nothing so debases him as revenge.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
Fate! There is no fate. Between the thought and the success God is the only agent. Fate is not the ruler, but the servant of Providence.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1St Baron LyttonRead
Similar quotes
Memoirs are the backstairs of history.
George MeredithRead
Our most merciful Father, seeing us to be oppressed and overwhelmed with the curse of the law . . . sent his only Son into the world and laid upon him all the sins of all men, saying, 'You be Peter that denier, Paul that persecutor, blasphemer and cruel oppressor, David that adulterer, that sinner who ate the apple in Paradise, that thief who hung upon the cross, and briefly, you be the person who has committed the sins of all men. See therefore that you pay and satisfy for them.'
Martin LutherRead
At one time I had given much thought to why men were so very rarely capable of living for an ideal. Now I saw that many, no, all men were capable of dying for one.
Hermann HesseRead
MAJESTY, n. The state and title of a king. Regarded with a just contempt by the Most Eminent Grand Masters, Grand Chancellors, Great Incohonees and Imperial Potentates of the ancient and honorable orders of republican America.
Ambrose BierceRead
I - and I still consider myself, I'm sorry to tell you, a Marxist and a Communist, but I couldn't help noticing how all the best Marxist analyses are always analyses of a failure.
Slavoj ZizekRead
As a cultural product of both 'East' and 'West', I do not believe there is a fundamental basis for a clash of civilisations, or that the West is the cause of all problems.
Ahmed ZewailRead