The Dowager’s 20 Greatest Downton Abbey Quips

“What is a weekend?”

“I was right about my maid. She’s leaving – to get married! How could she be so selfish?"

“First electricity, now telephones. Sometimes I feel as if I’m living in an H.G. Wells novel.”

“Mary won’t take Matthew Crawley, so we better get her settled before the bloom is quite gone off her rose.”

“I don’t dislike him, I just don’t like him. Which is quite different.”

“Don’t be a defeatist, dear, it’s very middle class.”

“I’m a woman, Mary. I can be as contrary as I choose.”

“She’s so slight a real necklace would flatten her.”

“Principles are like prayers. Noble of course, but awkward at a party.”

“No life appears rewarding if you think about it too much.”

“I wonder your halo doesn’t grow heavy. It must be like wearing a tiara around the clock.”

“There can be too much truth in any relationship.”

“Nothing succeeds like excess.”

“I won't take sides, it's true. But I don't think I could ever be described as ‘neutral.’”

“A change is as good as a rest.”

“The truth is neither here nor there. It's the look of the thing that matters.”

“It's the job of grandmothers to interfere!”

"I don't even know what that means, but it sounds almost as peculiar as you look."

"Oh, is her cooking so precisely timed? You couldn't tell."

“Everyone goes down the aisle with half the story hidden.”