O! Make me poor again, Somebody, I beg and pray, or my heart will break if this goes on! Pa, dear, make me poor again and take me home! I was bad enough there, but I have been so much worse here!
Bella speaks these lines in grief and agitation when Rokesmith announces his intention to leave the Boffin household due to the mistreatment and abuse he has suffered from Mr. Boffin. Bella is horrified at the way Boffin has behaved, and she blames his increasing wealth for making him greedy and suspicious. She also recognizes that money, and the desire for money, is having a similarly corrupting effect on her, and becomes afraid of the person she is becoming. Although her father is not present in this scene, she calls out to him because she recognizes that Mr. Wilfur is a pure and good man, who has never been influenced by money. Although Bella has tried to appear cynical and greedy, this moment reveals that she is actually still quite childlike and innocent, and that she wants to be a good person.
When we worked like the neighbors, we suited one another. Now we have left off work, we have left off suiting one another.
Mrs. Boffin speaks these lines to her husband as she explains why they have a different dynamic now that they have become wealthy. Mr. Boffin does not see any reason to behave differently just because they have much more money, but Mrs. Boffin is more aware of class and social status. At this point, it seems like she will be the one to be corrupted by her new fortune; interestingly, it will later be her husband who takes on the role of becoming greedy, paranoid, and obsessed with protecting his money. The lines foreshadow the way that the experience of possessing a fortune changes someone, and can drive a wedge between social and communal ties.
I don’t suppose at all about it… I ain’t one of the supposing sort. If you’d got your living to haul out of the river every day of your life, you mighn’t be much given to supposing.
Gaffer Hexam speaks these lines early in the novel, as he is being questioned by the two lawyers who are suspicious about possible foul play prior to bodies being found in the river. Gaffer is being defensive and unwilling to risk saying anything incriminating, but at the same time, he highlights an important distinction in class and education. Both of the lawyers are well-educated and earn comfortable incomes, and this gives them the luxury of being curious and even nosy. As a character struggling to keep himself and his children out of poverty, Gaffer is not going to ask any uncomfortable questions, or investigate the possible ethics of situations. His priority is to earn his living, and he does whatever it takes to do so, without reflecting much on those actions.
It was ridiculous to know that I shouldn’t like him—how could I like him, left to him in a will, like a dozen of spoons, with everything cut and dried beforehand.
Bella speaks these lines as she complains about the conditions in the Harmon will, which would have required her to marry a man she had never met and does not know anything about. Although Bella is annoyed that, with the death of John Harmon, she will never have the opportunity to be a wealthy woman, she is also aware that her marriage would quite likely not have been happy. Bella uses a simile, comparing herself to a set of cutlery, to highlight why she feels objectified by this arrangement. A will would usually make arrangements for physical objects, but not for people; Bella feels like she is being dehumanized, and that her own desires and personality were not considered. It was assumed she would be happy to marry anyone, as long as the marriage benefited her financially.
"It is a sensation not experienced by many mortals" said he, "to be looking into a churchyard on a wild windy night, and to feel that I no more hold a place among the living than these do, and even to know that I lie buried somewhere else, as they lie buried here."
John Harmon uses these lines to reflect to himself on the strange experience of having everyone believe that he is dead, and hearing himself talked about as a dead man. The lines clarify something most readers would have likely figured out by this point in the novel: that John Rokesmith is actually the secret identity adopted by John Harmon. Although adopting a new identity has given him newfound freedoms in many ways, it has also left him lonely and isolated because he cannot trust anyone with his secret. Although he is no longer set apart for his wealth, he is now cut off from the community by the secret he needs to keep.
Dead, I have found the true friends of my lifetime still as true, as tender, and as faithful as when I was alive... Dead, I have found them, when they might have slighted my name and passed greedily over my grave to ease and wealth, lingering by the way, like single-hearted children, to recall their love for me.
John Harmon speaks these lines to praise Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, and the loyalty and kindness they have shown. His adoption of a secret identity has allowed him to observe how everyone behaved when they believed him to be dead; this is particularly important, because as a wealthy man he could never be sure whether he had true friends, or whether people were deceiving him in hopes of profiting from his money. Even though they could have been greedy and preoccupied, he knows that the Boffins are honest and trustworthy. Although the Boffins are shown to be somewhat unsophisticated and unrefined, they are held out as models of integrity who cannot be corrupted by changing circumstances.
I am under the influence of some tremendous attraction which I have resisted in vain, and which overmasters me. You could draw me to fire, you could draw me to water, you could draw me to the gallows, you could draw me to any death.
Bradley Headstone speaks these words to Lizzie when he professes his love for her. His extreme examples highlight the intensity of what he feels, but Headstone also uses destructive imagery to speak about his love. Rather than suggesting that his love makes him better, or even just happy, he sees it as something pulling him towards dangerous and threatening outcomes. This suggests that Headstone does not welcome the feelings he experiences, and that he sees love as a kind of craving or hunger, not as a force for good, or as the stable cornerstone of a contented life together.
Tell him I am a match-maker; tell him I am an artful and designing woman; tell him you are sure his daughter is best out of my house and my company. Tell him any such things of me; they will all be true.
Mrs. Lammle speaks these lines as she urges Twemlow to persuade Podsnap to cease to allow his daughter to spend time with the Lammles. In a novel with many corrupt and scheming characters, Mrs. Lammle is an example of someone who has bad impulses but also finds herself unable to fully see them through. Although she marries a man she does not love as part of a greedy scheme, and initially plans to trick and exploit Georgiana Podsnap, Mrs. Lammle is unwilling to make another woman suffer in the same way she has. She is willing to take the blame, and have her social reputation be ruined, in order to try and protect Georgiana.
It was a foggy day in London, and the fog was heavy and dark. Animate London, with smarting eyes and irritated lungs, was blinking, wheezing, and choking; inanimate London was a sooty spectre, divided in purpose between being visible and invisible, and so being wholly neither.
Dickens is known for his vivid descriptions of the city of London, and here he presents it in a grim and unflattering light. Pollution, stemming from increasing levels of industry and a growing population, was making the city more and more unpleasant to live in. Describing the unpleasant conditions of the city reflects the novel's preoccupation with showing how capitalism and human greed are corrupting forces. The dirty, foggy, and smoky conditions echo how the waste found in the river, including human corpses, and the waste products of the dust mounds are an inevitable part of living in an often dangerous and corrupt city.
If there's a good thing to be done, can't it be done on its own merits? If there's a bad thing to be done, can it ever be Patroned and Patronessed right?
Mr. Boffin speaks these lines as he complains about a system of philanthropy where wealthy patrons would be recognized for their support of specific causes. While this system does allow for some charitable work, it puts the emphasis on the public recognition and reputation of the individual patron, not the cause they support. Although Mr. Boffin is not typically an intellectual or sophisticated character, he shrewdly notes that it would be better for people to do good work quietly and discreetly, without calling attention to themselves. The comment serves as an example of Mr. Boffin being critical of the high society he has become part of.
