Ebenezer Scrooge: Why do you walk the earth? Why'd you come to persecute me? And what is that great chain you wear?

Jacob Marley's Ghost: I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it, link by link and yard by yard, while on Earth, and now I will never be rid of it, any more than you will ever be rid of yours!

Ebenezer Scrooge: [shocked] Mine?

Jacob Marley's Ghost: It was as heavy and long as this seven Christmases ago. It's a terrible, ponderous chain you are making, Scrooge!

Ebenezer Scrooge: Tell me more, Marley, but speak comfort to me!

Jacob Marley's Ghost: I have none to give.

Ebenezer Scrooge: None?

Jacob Marley's Ghost: Comfort comes from other sources, Ebenezer Scrooge, and is given by other ministers than I to other kinds of men than you. When I lived, my spirit, like yours, never walked beyond the narrow limits of our counting house.

Ebenezer Scrooge: But you were always a good man of business, Jacob.

Jacob Marley's Ghost: Mankind should be our business, Ebenezer, but we seldom attend to it... as you shall see.”
Tagged: Comfort, Chains, Ghosts
Read:
Scrooge

Explore more quotes:


About the author

This page was created by our editorial team. Each page is manually curated, researched, collected, and issued by our staff writers. Quotes contained on this page have been double checked for their citations, their accuracy and the impact it will have on our readers.

Kelly Peacock is an accomplished poet and social media expert based in Brooklyn, New York. Kelly has a Bachelor's degree in creative writing from Farieligh Dickinson University and has contributed to many literary and cultural publications. Kelly assists on a wide variety of quote inputting and social media functions for Quote Catalog. Visit her personal website here.

Kendra Syrdal is a writer, editor, partner, and senior publisher for The Thought & Expression Company. Over the last few years she has been personally responsible for writing, editing, and producing over 30+ million pageviews on Thought Catalog.