The beauty of the earth is but a breath, and man is but a shadow.

Such is hope, Heaven's own gift to struggling mortals; [...].

The only pupil who evinced the slightest tendency towards locomotion or playfulness was Master Squeers, and as his chief amusement was to tread upon the other boys' toes in his new boots, his flow of spirits was rather disagreeable than otherwise.

'A widow, ma'am?' said Ralph.
'Yes, she is a widow,' replied the lady.
'A poor widow, ma'am?' said Ralph, with a powerful emphasis on that little adjective which conveys so much.

'Think of who?' inquired Mrs Squeers; who (as she often remarked) was no grammarian, thank God.

'Your way lies there, sir,' said Ralph, in a suppressed voice, that some devil might have owned with pride.

'Ay,' replied Ralph, turning upon him with an angry look. 'Help me on with this spencer, and don't repeat after me, like a croaking parrot.'
'I wish I was a parrot,' said Newman, sulkily.
'I wish you were,' rejoined Ralph, drawing his spencer on; 'I'd have wrung your neck long ago.'

'Ah, it's me, and me's the first person singular, nominative case, agreeing with the verb "it's," and governed by Squeers understood, as a acorn, a hour; but when the h is sounded, the a only is to be used, as a hand, a heart, a highway,' replied Mr Squeers, quoting at random from the grammer. 'at least if it isn't, you don't know any better, and if it is, I've done it accidentally.'

When men are about to commit or to sanction the commission of some injustice, it is not at all uncommon for them to express pity for the object either of that or some parallell proceeding, and to feel themselves at the time quite virtuous and moral, and immensely superior to those who express no pity at all.

[...], and sprang from his bed with an elasticity of spirit which is happily the lot of young persons, or the world would never be stocked with old ones.