A Christmas Carol Quotes

Quote 1: "Oh! but he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster." Stave 1, pg. 59

Quote 2: "'Bah! Humbug!'" Stave 1, pg. 60

Quote 3: "'If they would rather die, . . . they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.'" Stave 1, pg. 63

Quote 4: "'Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!'" Stave 1, pg. 71

Quote 5: "'Say that his power lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness [Fezziwig] gives is quite as great as if it cost a fortune.'" Stave 2, pg. 83

Quote 6: "'You may -- the memory of what is past half makes me hope you will -- have pain in this. A very, very brief time, and you will dismiss the recollection of it gladly, as an unprofitable dream from which it happened well that you awoke. May you be happy in the life you have chosen!'" Stave 2, pg. 85

Quote 7: "'he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day who made lame beggars walk and blind men see.'" Stave 3, pg. 94

Quote 8: "'God bless us, every one!'" Stave 3, pg. 96

Quote 9: "'[h]e frightened everyone away from him when he was alive, to profit [the thieves] when he was dead!'" Stave 4, pg. 111

Quote 10: "'If there is any person in the town who feels emotion caused by this man's death, . . . show that person to me, Spirit, I beseech you!'" Stave 4, pg. 113

Quote 11: "'Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of the things that May be only?'" Stave 4, pg. 117

Quote 12: "'I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me.'" Stave 4, pg. 117

Quote 13: "[Scrooge] went to church, and walked about the streets, and watched the people hurrying to and fro, and patted the children on the head, and questioned beggars, and looked down into the kitchens of houses, and up to the windows; and found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had never dreamed that any walk -- that anything -- could give him so much happiness." Stave 5, pg. 121