Well, He had known what love was-a sharp pang, a fierce experience, in the midst of whose flames he was struggling! but, through that furnace he would fight his way out into the serenity of middle age,-all the richer and more human for having known this great passion.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the intense and transformative nature of love and how it enriches one's life, even amidst struggle.
In this quote, Elizabeth Gaskell captures the essence of love as both a consuming force and a profound experience that shapes a person. The protagonist recognizes love as a challenging journey—likely fraught with pain—but also acknowledges the personal growth and deeper humanity that arises from such an intense emotional experience. The furnace metaphor suggests that going through these struggles ultimately leads to a more enlightened and serene state in later life.
In practice
During a wedding toast, someone might reference this quote to highlight the transformative power of love.
Neither loss of father, nor loss of mother, dear as she was to Mr Thornton, could have poisoned the remembrance of the weeks, the days, the hours, when a walk of two miles, every step of which was pleasant, as it brought him nearer and nearer to her, took him to her sweet presence - every step of which was rich, as each recurring moment that bore him away from her made him recal some fresh grace in her demeanour, or pleasant pungency in her character.
It is the first changes among familiar things that make such a mystery of time to the young; afterwards we lose the sense of the mysterious. I take changes in all I see as a matter of course. The instability of all human things is familiar to me, to you it is new and oppressive." (Mr. Bell)
Loyalty and obedience to wisdom and justice are fine; but it is still finer to defy arbitrary power, unjustly and cruelly used--not on behalf of ourselves, but on behalf of others more helpless.
Thinking has, many a time, made me sad, darling; but doing never did in all my life....My precept is, do something, my sister, do good if you can; but at any rate, do something.
Mr. Thornton felt that in this influx no one was speaking to Margaret, and was restless under this apparent neglect. But he never went near her himself; he did not look at her. Only, he knew what she was doing — or not doing — better than anyone else in the room. Margaret was so unconscious of herself, and so much amused by watching other people, that she never thought whether she was left unnoticed or not.
How was it that he haunted her imagination so persistently? What could it be? Why did she care for what he thought, in spite of all her pride in spite of herself? She believed that she could have borne the sense of Almighty displeasure, because He knew all, and could read her penitence, and hear her cries for help in time to come. But Mr.Thornton-why did she tremble, and hide her face in the pillow? What strong feeling had overtaking her at last?
I am bewildered by the death of love. And my responsibility for it.
La Maga did not know that my kisses were like eyes which began to open up beyond her, and that I went along outside as if I saw a different concept of the world, the dizzy pilot of a black prow which cut the water of time and negated it.
Your eyes in which I travel Have given to signs along the roads A meaning alien to the earth.
I love you so much that nothing can matter to me - not even you...Only my love- not your answer. Not even your indifference
Then let yourself love all that you take delight in_x000D_ _x000D_ Accept yourself whole, accept the heritage_x000D_ _x000D_ That shaped you and is passed on from age to age_x000D_ _x000D_ Down to your entity. Remain mysterious;_x000D_ _x000D_ Rather than be pure, accept yourself as numerous.
God is to be worshiped as the one Beloved, dearer than everything in this and the next life.
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