people are almost always better than their neighbors think they are
 George Eliot, Middlemarch (1872). copy citation

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Author George Eliot
Source Middlemarch
Topic reputation slander prejudice neighborhood
Date 1872
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/145/145-h/145-h.htm

Context

“He would probably take it as a deadly insult. I have more than once experienced the difficulty of speaking to him on personal matters. And—one should know the truth about his conduct beforehand, to feel very confident of a good result.»
«I feel convinced that his conduct has not been guilty: I believe that people are almost always better than their neighbors think they are,» said Dorothea. Some of her intensest experience in the last two years had set her mind strongly in opposition to any unfavorable construction of others; and for the first time she felt rather discontented with Mr. Farebrother.” source

Meaning and analysis

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