We have changed our privacy policy. In addition, we use cookies on our website for various purposes. By continuing on our website, you consent to our use of cookies. You can learn about our practices by reading our privacy policy.

A Tale of Two Cities Loyalty Quotes

How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Volume.Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #1

"If, when I hint to you of a Home that is before us, where I will be true to you with all my duty and with all my faithful service, I bring back the remembrance of a Home long desolate, while your poor heart pined away, weep for it, weep for it!" (1.6.77)

Lucie’s immediate devotion to a father that she’s never met becomes the first of many opportunities for Dickens to demonstrate the almost incredible bond that unites the two.

Quote #2

"Do you imagine—" Mr. Lorry had begun, when Miss Pross took him up short with:

"Never imagine anything. Have no imagination at all." (2.6.54-5)

Miss Pross attributes her unquestioning loyalty to Lucie to her lack of imagination: she doesn’t have to imagine how Lucie or Doctor Manette would feel, she just does what she can to shield them from the rest of the world.

Quote #3

"It's enough for you," retorted Mr. Cruncher, "to be the wife of a honest tradesman, and not to occupy your female mind with calculations when he took to his trade or when he didn't. A honouring and obeying wife would let his trade alone altogether. Call yourself a religious woman? If you're a religious woman, give me a irreligious one!" (2.14.64)

Mr. Cruncher’s irrational assumption that his wife’s "flopping" ruins his success as a grave-digger allows Dickens to throw some of his characteristic humor into an otherwise serious novel.