Nicholas Nickleby

by

Charles Dickens

Ralph Character Analysis

Ralph is Nicholas and Kate’s uncle, Nicholas Sr.’s brother, and Mrs. Nickleby’s brother-in-law. At the end of the novel, it’s revealed that he is also Smike’s biological father. Ralph is the novel’s primary antagonist. He values money and power above all else, which causes him to alienate people close to him, including Nicholas and Kate, who initially turn to him for help. Ralph is portrayed as the opposite of Nicholas. While Nicholas is generous and puts the needs of others above his own, Ralph is miserly and greedy, and he always puts himself first. Ralph’s approach ultimately leads to his undoing. Because Ralph shows no loyalty toward others, no one shows him any loyalty either, which leaves Ralph isolated and vulnerable to betrayal. For example, Ralph’s poor treatment of employees like Brooker and Newman leads Brooker and Newman to turn on him, and they team up to determine that Smike is Ralph’s son. When they reveal that knowledge to Ralph, Ralph can’t bear that he persecuted his own son, while his son idolized his nemesis, Nicholas. Ralph becomes despondent to the point that he dies by suicide. While Ralph dies miserable and alone, Nicholas lives a long life full of joy, friendship, and family. With that in mind, the novel contrasts the two characters to argue that the world rewards nobility and goodness while it punishes Ralph’s brand of greed and selfishness.

Ralph Quotes in Nicholas Nickleby

The Nicholas Nickleby quotes below are all either spoken by Ralph or refer to Ralph. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Greed and Selfishness Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1 Quotes

Gold conjures up a mist about a man, more destructive of all his old senses and lulling to his feelings than the fumes of charcoal.

Related Characters: Ralph, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:

Speculation is a round game; the players see little or nothing of their cards at first starting; gains may be great—and so may losses. The run of luck went against Mr. Nickleby. A mania prevailed, a bubble burst, four stock-brokers took villa residences at Florence, four hundred nobodies were ruined, and among them Mr. Nickleby.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:

'The very house I live in,' sighed the poor gentleman [Nicholas Sr.], 'may be taken from me tomorrow. Not an article of my old furniture, but will be sold to strangers!'

The last reflection hurt him so much, that he took at once to his bed; apparently resolved to keep that, at all events.

'Cheer up, sir!' said the apothecary.

'You mustn't let yourself be cast down, sir,' said the nurse.

'Such things happen every day,' remarked the lawyer.

'And it is very sinful to rebel against them,' whispered the clergyman.

'And what no man with a family ought to do,' added the neighbours.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 21
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 Quotes

The kind-hearted gentleman omitted to add that Newman Noggs, being utterly destitute, served him for rather less than the usual wages of a boy of thirteen.

Related Characters: Ralph, Newman
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis:

And after him, came the Scotch member, with various pleasant allusions to the probable amount of profits, which increased the good humour that the poetry had awakened; and all the speeches put together did exactly what they were intended to do, and established in the hearers' minds that there was no speculation so promising, or at the same time so praiseworthy, as the United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company.

Related Characters: Ralph
Related Symbols: United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

'The doctors could attribute it to no particular disease,' said Mrs. Nickleby; shedding tears. 'We have too much reason to fear that he died of a broken heart.'

'Pooh!' said Ralph, 'there's no such thing. I can understand a man's dying of a broken neck, or suffering from a broken arm, or a broken head, or a broken leg, or a broken nose; but a broken heart!—nonsense, it's the cant of the day. If a man can't pay his debts, he dies of a broken heart, and his widow's a martyr.'

'Some people, I believe, have no hearts to break,' observed Nicholas, quietly.

Related Characters: Nicholas (speaker), Ralph (speaker), Mrs. Nickleby (speaker), Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 36
Explanation and Analysis:

The face of the old man was stern, hard-featured, and forbidding; that of the young one, open, handsome, and ingenuous. The old man's eye was keen with the twinklings of avarice and cunning; the young man's bright with the light of intelligence and spirit. His figure was somewhat slight, but manly and well formed; and, apart from all the grace of youth and comeliness, there was an emanation from the warm young heart in his look and bearing which kept the old man down.

However striking such a contrast as this may be to lookers-on, none ever feel it with half the keenness or acuteness of perfection with which it strikes to the very soul of him whose inferiority it marks. It galled Ralph to the heart's core, and he hated Nicholas from that hour.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph
Page Number: 37
Explanation and Analysis:

The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again.

Related Characters: Nicholas (speaker), Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby
Page Number: 41
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

My dear young Man.

I know the world. Your father did not, or he would not have done me a kindness when there was no hope of return. You do not, or you would not be bound on such a journey.

If ever you want a shelter in London (don't be angry at this, I once thought I never should), they know where I live, at the sign of the Crown, in Silver Street, Golden Square. It is at the corner of Silver Street and James Street, with a bar door both ways. You can come at night. Once, nobody was ashamed—never mind that. It's all over.

Related Characters: Newman (speaker), Nicholas, Ralph, Squeers , Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 93
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10 Quotes

'My poor brother, ma'am,' interposed Ralph tartly, 'had no idea what business was—was unacquainted, I verily believe, with the very meaning of the word.'

'I fear he was,' said Mrs. Nickleby, with her handkerchief to her eyes. 'If it hadn't been for me, I don't know what would have become of him.' […]

'Repining is of no use, ma'am,' said Ralph. 'Of all fruitless errands, sending a tear to look after a day that is gone is the most fruitless.'

'So it is,' sobbed Mrs. Nickleby. 'So it is.'

'As you feel so keenly, in your own purse and person, the consequences of inattention to business, ma'am,' said Ralph, 'I am sure you will impress upon your children the necessity of attaching themselves to it early in life.'

'Of course I must see that,' rejoined Mrs. Nickleby.

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Mrs. Nickleby (speaker), Kate, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 126
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 19 Quotes

Such is hope, Heaven's own gift to struggling mortals; pervading, like some subtle essence from the skies, all things, both good and bad; as universal as death, and more infectious than disease!

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby
Page Number: 227-228
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 31 Quotes

He thought of what his home might be if Kate were there; he placed her in the empty chair, looked upon her, heard her speak; he felt again upon his arm the gentle pressure of the trembling hand; he strewed his costly rooms with the hundred silent tokens of feminine presence and occupation; he came back again to the cold fireside and the silent dreary splendour; and in that one glimpse of a better nature, born as it was in selfish thoughts, the rich man felt himself friendless, childless, and alone. Gold, for the instant, lost its lustre in his eyes, for there were countless treasures of the heart which it could never purchase.

A very slight circumstance was sufficient to banish such reflections from the mind of such a man. As Ralph looked vacantly out across the yard towards the window of the other office, he became suddenly aware of the earnest observation of Newman Noggs […]

Ralph exchanged his dreamy posture for his accustomed business attitude: the face of Newman disappeared, and the train of thought took to flight, all simultaneously, and in an instant.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Newman
Page Number: 384
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 35 Quotes

There was something so earnest and guileless in the way in which all this was said, and such a complete disregard of all conventional restraints and coldnesses, that Nicholas could not resist it. Among men who have any sound and sterling qualities, there is nothing so contagious as pure openness of heart. Nicholas took the infection instantly, and ran over the main points of his little history without reserve: merely suppressing names, and touching as lightly as possible upon his uncle's treatment of Kate. The old man listened with great attention, and when he had concluded, drew his arm eagerly through his own.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Kate, Charles
Page Number: 430
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 44 Quotes

There are some men who, living with the one object of enriching themselves, no matter by what means, and being perfectly conscious of the baseness and rascality of the means which they will use every day towards this end, affect nevertheless—even to themselves—a high tone of moral rectitude, and shake their heads and sigh over the depravity of the world. Some of the craftiest scoundrels that ever walked this earth, or rather—for walking implies, at least, an erect position and the bearing of a man—that ever crawled and crept through life by its dirtiest and narrowest ways, will gravely jot down in diaries the events of every day, and keep a regular debtor and creditor account with Heaven, which shall always show a floating balance in their own favour […]

Ralph Nickleby was not a man of this stamp. Stern, unyielding, dogged, and impenetrable, Ralph cared for nothing in life, or beyond it, save the gratification of two passions, avarice, the first and predominant appetite of his nature, and hatred, the second.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Mulberry
Page Number: 536
Explanation and Analysis:

The only scriptural admonition that Ralph Nickleby heeded, in the letter, was 'know thyself.' He knew himself well, and choosing to imagine that all mankind were cast in the same mould, hated them; for, though no man hates himself, the coldest among us having too much self-love for that, yet most men unconsciously judge the world from themselves, and it will be very generally found that those who sneer habitually at human nature, and affect to despise it, are among its worst and least pleasant samples.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Mulberry
Page Number: 537
Explanation and Analysis:

'There is some spell about that boy,' said Ralph, grinding his teeth. 'Circumstances conspire to help him. Talk of fortune's favours! What is even money to such Devil's luck as this?'

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Nicholas, Mulberry
Page Number: 537
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 52 Quotes

'Hope to the last!' said Newman, clapping him on the back. 'Always hope; that's a dear boy. Never leave off hoping; it don't answer. Do you mind me, Nick? It don't answer. Don't leave a stone unturned. It's always something, to know you've done the most you could. But, don't leave off hoping, or it's of no use doing anything. Hope, hope, to the last!'

Related Characters: Newman (speaker), Nicholas, Ralph, Madeline, Arthur
Page Number: 641
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 54 Quotes

'I must go upstairs for a few minutes, to finish dressing. When I come down, I'll bring Madeline with me. Do you know, I had a very strange dream last night, which I have not remembered till this instant. I dreamt that it was this morning, and you and I had been talking as we have been this minute; that I went upstairs, for the very purpose for which I am going now; and that as I stretched out my hand to take Madeline's, and lead her down, the floor sunk with me, and after falling from such an indescribable and tremendous height as the imagination scarcely conceives, except in dreams, I alighted in a grave.'

'And you awoke, and found you were lying on your back, or with your head hanging over the bedside, or suffering some pain from indigestion?' said Ralph. 'Pshaw, Mr. Bray! Do as I do (you will have the opportunity, now that a constant round of pleasure and enjoyment opens upon you), and, occupying yourself a little more by day, have no time to think of what you dream by night.'

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Mr. Bray (speaker), Nicholas, Madeline, Arthur
Page Number: 671
Explanation and Analysis:
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Ralph Quotes in Nicholas Nickleby

The Nicholas Nickleby quotes below are all either spoken by Ralph or refer to Ralph. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Greed and Selfishness Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1 Quotes

Gold conjures up a mist about a man, more destructive of all his old senses and lulling to his feelings than the fumes of charcoal.

Related Characters: Ralph, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:

Speculation is a round game; the players see little or nothing of their cards at first starting; gains may be great—and so may losses. The run of luck went against Mr. Nickleby. A mania prevailed, a bubble burst, four stock-brokers took villa residences at Florence, four hundred nobodies were ruined, and among them Mr. Nickleby.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:

'The very house I live in,' sighed the poor gentleman [Nicholas Sr.], 'may be taken from me tomorrow. Not an article of my old furniture, but will be sold to strangers!'

The last reflection hurt him so much, that he took at once to his bed; apparently resolved to keep that, at all events.

'Cheer up, sir!' said the apothecary.

'You mustn't let yourself be cast down, sir,' said the nurse.

'Such things happen every day,' remarked the lawyer.

'And it is very sinful to rebel against them,' whispered the clergyman.

'And what no man with a family ought to do,' added the neighbours.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 21
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 Quotes

The kind-hearted gentleman omitted to add that Newman Noggs, being utterly destitute, served him for rather less than the usual wages of a boy of thirteen.

Related Characters: Ralph, Newman
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis:

And after him, came the Scotch member, with various pleasant allusions to the probable amount of profits, which increased the good humour that the poetry had awakened; and all the speeches put together did exactly what they were intended to do, and established in the hearers' minds that there was no speculation so promising, or at the same time so praiseworthy, as the United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company.

Related Characters: Ralph
Related Symbols: United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

'The doctors could attribute it to no particular disease,' said Mrs. Nickleby; shedding tears. 'We have too much reason to fear that he died of a broken heart.'

'Pooh!' said Ralph, 'there's no such thing. I can understand a man's dying of a broken neck, or suffering from a broken arm, or a broken head, or a broken leg, or a broken nose; but a broken heart!—nonsense, it's the cant of the day. If a man can't pay his debts, he dies of a broken heart, and his widow's a martyr.'

'Some people, I believe, have no hearts to break,' observed Nicholas, quietly.

Related Characters: Nicholas (speaker), Ralph (speaker), Mrs. Nickleby (speaker), Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 36
Explanation and Analysis:

The face of the old man was stern, hard-featured, and forbidding; that of the young one, open, handsome, and ingenuous. The old man's eye was keen with the twinklings of avarice and cunning; the young man's bright with the light of intelligence and spirit. His figure was somewhat slight, but manly and well formed; and, apart from all the grace of youth and comeliness, there was an emanation from the warm young heart in his look and bearing which kept the old man down.

However striking such a contrast as this may be to lookers-on, none ever feel it with half the keenness or acuteness of perfection with which it strikes to the very soul of him whose inferiority it marks. It galled Ralph to the heart's core, and he hated Nicholas from that hour.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph
Page Number: 37
Explanation and Analysis:

The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again.

Related Characters: Nicholas (speaker), Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby
Page Number: 41
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

My dear young Man.

I know the world. Your father did not, or he would not have done me a kindness when there was no hope of return. You do not, or you would not be bound on such a journey.

If ever you want a shelter in London (don't be angry at this, I once thought I never should), they know where I live, at the sign of the Crown, in Silver Street, Golden Square. It is at the corner of Silver Street and James Street, with a bar door both ways. You can come at night. Once, nobody was ashamed—never mind that. It's all over.

Related Characters: Newman (speaker), Nicholas, Ralph, Squeers , Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 93
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10 Quotes

'My poor brother, ma'am,' interposed Ralph tartly, 'had no idea what business was—was unacquainted, I verily believe, with the very meaning of the word.'

'I fear he was,' said Mrs. Nickleby, with her handkerchief to her eyes. 'If it hadn't been for me, I don't know what would have become of him.' […]

'Repining is of no use, ma'am,' said Ralph. 'Of all fruitless errands, sending a tear to look after a day that is gone is the most fruitless.'

'So it is,' sobbed Mrs. Nickleby. 'So it is.'

'As you feel so keenly, in your own purse and person, the consequences of inattention to business, ma'am,' said Ralph, 'I am sure you will impress upon your children the necessity of attaching themselves to it early in life.'

'Of course I must see that,' rejoined Mrs. Nickleby.

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Mrs. Nickleby (speaker), Kate, Nicholas Sr.
Page Number: 126
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 19 Quotes

Such is hope, Heaven's own gift to struggling mortals; pervading, like some subtle essence from the skies, all things, both good and bad; as universal as death, and more infectious than disease!

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Mrs. Nickleby
Page Number: 227-228
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 31 Quotes

He thought of what his home might be if Kate were there; he placed her in the empty chair, looked upon her, heard her speak; he felt again upon his arm the gentle pressure of the trembling hand; he strewed his costly rooms with the hundred silent tokens of feminine presence and occupation; he came back again to the cold fireside and the silent dreary splendour; and in that one glimpse of a better nature, born as it was in selfish thoughts, the rich man felt himself friendless, childless, and alone. Gold, for the instant, lost its lustre in his eyes, for there were countless treasures of the heart which it could never purchase.

A very slight circumstance was sufficient to banish such reflections from the mind of such a man. As Ralph looked vacantly out across the yard towards the window of the other office, he became suddenly aware of the earnest observation of Newman Noggs […]

Ralph exchanged his dreamy posture for his accustomed business attitude: the face of Newman disappeared, and the train of thought took to flight, all simultaneously, and in an instant.

Related Characters: Ralph, Kate, Newman
Page Number: 384
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 35 Quotes

There was something so earnest and guileless in the way in which all this was said, and such a complete disregard of all conventional restraints and coldnesses, that Nicholas could not resist it. Among men who have any sound and sterling qualities, there is nothing so contagious as pure openness of heart. Nicholas took the infection instantly, and ran over the main points of his little history without reserve: merely suppressing names, and touching as lightly as possible upon his uncle's treatment of Kate. The old man listened with great attention, and when he had concluded, drew his arm eagerly through his own.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Kate, Charles
Page Number: 430
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 44 Quotes

There are some men who, living with the one object of enriching themselves, no matter by what means, and being perfectly conscious of the baseness and rascality of the means which they will use every day towards this end, affect nevertheless—even to themselves—a high tone of moral rectitude, and shake their heads and sigh over the depravity of the world. Some of the craftiest scoundrels that ever walked this earth, or rather—for walking implies, at least, an erect position and the bearing of a man—that ever crawled and crept through life by its dirtiest and narrowest ways, will gravely jot down in diaries the events of every day, and keep a regular debtor and creditor account with Heaven, which shall always show a floating balance in their own favour […]

Ralph Nickleby was not a man of this stamp. Stern, unyielding, dogged, and impenetrable, Ralph cared for nothing in life, or beyond it, save the gratification of two passions, avarice, the first and predominant appetite of his nature, and hatred, the second.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Mulberry
Page Number: 536
Explanation and Analysis:

The only scriptural admonition that Ralph Nickleby heeded, in the letter, was 'know thyself.' He knew himself well, and choosing to imagine that all mankind were cast in the same mould, hated them; for, though no man hates himself, the coldest among us having too much self-love for that, yet most men unconsciously judge the world from themselves, and it will be very generally found that those who sneer habitually at human nature, and affect to despise it, are among its worst and least pleasant samples.

Related Characters: Nicholas, Ralph, Mulberry
Page Number: 537
Explanation and Analysis:

'There is some spell about that boy,' said Ralph, grinding his teeth. 'Circumstances conspire to help him. Talk of fortune's favours! What is even money to such Devil's luck as this?'

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Nicholas, Mulberry
Page Number: 537
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 52 Quotes

'Hope to the last!' said Newman, clapping him on the back. 'Always hope; that's a dear boy. Never leave off hoping; it don't answer. Do you mind me, Nick? It don't answer. Don't leave a stone unturned. It's always something, to know you've done the most you could. But, don't leave off hoping, or it's of no use doing anything. Hope, hope, to the last!'

Related Characters: Newman (speaker), Nicholas, Ralph, Madeline, Arthur
Page Number: 641
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 54 Quotes

'I must go upstairs for a few minutes, to finish dressing. When I come down, I'll bring Madeline with me. Do you know, I had a very strange dream last night, which I have not remembered till this instant. I dreamt that it was this morning, and you and I had been talking as we have been this minute; that I went upstairs, for the very purpose for which I am going now; and that as I stretched out my hand to take Madeline's, and lead her down, the floor sunk with me, and after falling from such an indescribable and tremendous height as the imagination scarcely conceives, except in dreams, I alighted in a grave.'

'And you awoke, and found you were lying on your back, or with your head hanging over the bedside, or suffering some pain from indigestion?' said Ralph. 'Pshaw, Mr. Bray! Do as I do (you will have the opportunity, now that a constant round of pleasure and enjoyment opens upon you), and, occupying yourself a little more by day, have no time to think of what you dream by night.'

Related Characters: Ralph (speaker), Mr. Bray (speaker), Nicholas, Madeline, Arthur
Page Number: 671
Explanation and Analysis: