Beatrix Potter citations

“I cannot rest, I must draw, however poor the result, and when I have a bad time come over me it is a stronger desire than ever.”

“Once upon a time there were four little Rabbits, and their names were – Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail, and Peter.”

“Believe there is a great power silently working all things for good, behave yourself and never mind the rest.”

“Thank God I have the seeing eye, that is to say, as I lie in bed I can walk step by step on the fells and rough land seeing every stone and flower and patch of bog and cotton pass where my old legs will never take me again.”

“I hold that a strongly marked personality can influence descendants for generations.”

“Thank goodness I was never sent to school; it would have rubbed off some of the originality.”

“I remember I used to half believe and wholly play with fairies when I was a child. What heaven can be more real than to retain the spirit-world of childhood, tempered and balanced by knowledge and common-sense…”

“What heaven can be more real than to retain the spirit-world of childhood?”

“All outward forms of religion are almost useless, and are the causes of endless strife…. Believe there is a great power silently working all things for good, behave yourself and never mind the rest.”

“Thank goodness my education was neglected.”

“Most people, after one success, are so cringingly afraid of doing less well that they rub all the edge off their subsequent work.”

“It is said that the effect of eating too much lettuce is "soporific." I have never felt sleepy after eating lettuces; but then I am not a rabbit.”

“I hold an old-fashioned notion that a happy marriage is the crown of a woman’s life.”

“Peter was not very well during the evening. His mother put him to bed, and made some chamomile tea: "One table-spoonful to be taken at bedtime.”

“This is a fierce bad rabbit;
look at his savage whiskers,
and his claws and his turned-up tail.”

“Don't go into Mr. McGregor's garden: your father had an accident there; he was put in a pie by Mrs. McGregor.”

“This is a Tale about a tail — a tail that belonged to a little red squirrel, and his name was Nutkin.”