Dracula Good vs Evil Quotes

It is the eve of St. George’s Day. Do you not know that tonight, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will have full sway? Do you know where you are going, and what you are going to do?

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 1. As Jonathan Harker leaves his hotel to go to Castle Dracula, the hotel owner’s wife warns him against visiting the Count on that particular day. In Christian legend good triumphs over evil on that day, but according to Transylvanian superstition witches get together for occult ceremonies on this night and it is believed that evil may prevail over good. Harker doesn’t take the landlady’s warning seriously. Her warning is foreshadowing of the horrifying events to come.

When the Count saw my face, his eyes blazed with a sort of demoniac fury, and he suddenly made a grab at my throat. I drew away and his hand touched the string of beads which held the crucifix. It made an instant change in him, for the fury passed so quickly that I could hardly believe that it was ever there.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 2. When Jonathan cuts himself shaving, Dracula cannot resist his urge for fresh blood. He attempts to attack Jonathan and drink his blood. But Jonathan is saved by the crucifix, a holy object symbolizing good, which appears to repel the evil Dracula.

"Are we to have nothing tonight?" said one of them, with a low laugh, as she pointed to the bag which he had thrown upon the floor, and which moved as though there were some living thing within it. For answer he nodded his head. One of the women jumped forward and opened it. If my ears did not deceive me there was a gasp and a low wail, as of a half smothered child.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 3. In one of the most terrifying scenes from the novel, the horrified Jonathan Harker recounts how Count Dracula offers the three vampire ladies a bag containing a small, half-smothered child to feast on. The vampiresses’ consumption of the child is representative of how they and Dracula contaminate goodness with their evil.

At least God’s mercy is better than that of these monsters, and the precipice is steep and high. At its foot a man may sleep – as a man. Good-bye, all! Mina!

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 4. In his journal, Jonathan Harker writes about his imprisonment in Dracula’s castle and his beloved Mina, whom he is unsure he will ever see again. The "monsters" he refers to are Dracula and his three Brides, having learned that they are far from human. He wonders if his only escape is to jump off the high precipice and kill himself and trust the mercy of God.

The waves rose in growing fury, each over-topping its fellow, till in a very few minutes the lately glassy sea was like a roaring and devouring monster.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 7. As Dracula’s ship makes its way to the English shores, a newspaper reports how "one of the greatest and suddenest storms on record" batters Whitby. The Count with fifty boxes of earth from Transylvania are washed ashore. The strange storm is symbolic of the approaching evil as represented by Dracula, to threaten the good people of England.

Masses of sea-fog came drifting inland. White, wet clouds, which swept by in ghostly fashion, so dank and damp and cold that it needed but little effort of imagination to think that the spirits of those lost at sea were touching their living brethren with the clammy hands of death.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 7. The storm of the century hits Whitby and during it a mysterious Russian ship called the Demeter is washed up at Whitby carrying Dracula. None of the crew members on the ship survive. The storm represents the coming of Dracula and his evil to the shores of England.

There was undoubtedly something, long and black, bending over the half-reclining white figure. I called in fright, "Lucy! Lucy!" and something raised a head, and from where I was I could see a white face and red, gleaming eyes.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 8. Mina follows the sleepwalking Lucy out of the house to the cemetery, where she sees the nightgowned Lucy half-reclined over a tombstone with the shadowy figure of Dracula bending over her. The sexual implications here are pretty obvious, with Dracula’s attack on Lucy very much in the nature of a sexual assault.

"Oh, how we are beset! How are all the powers of the devils against us!"
Suddenly he jumped to his feet. "Come," he said, "come, we must see and act. Devils or no devils, or all the devils at once, it matters not. We must fight him all the same."

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 11. Van Helsing breaks down here, after Lucy’s mother removes the garlic flowers the professor left in her room to protect her from supernatural evil. Prof. Helsing represents the forces of good doing battle against the devil.

We recognized the features of Lucy Westenra. Lucy Westenra, but yet how changed. The sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and the purity to voluptuous wantonness.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. Dr. Seward cannot believe the change in Lucy Wesenra when he observes her as a vampire in the graveyard. The once sweet and virtuous young girl has transformed into a voluptuous, wanton creature of evil. A testament to Dracula’s power to take something good and turn it into evil.

Lucy’s eyes in form and colour; but Lucy’s eyes unclean and full of hell-fire, instead of the pure, gentle orbs we knew. At that moment the remnant of my love passed into hate and loathing.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. Dr. John Seward writes this description of Lucy when she appears in her vampire form. No longer the paragon of virtue and innocence, Dracula has transformed her into one of his devils. At that moment Seward says the love he and his friends shared for her has turned into hate.

She still advanced, however, and with a languorous, voluptuous grace, said "Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms are hungry for you. Come, and we can rest together. Come, my husband, come!"
There was something diabolically sweet in her tones, something of the tingling of glass when struck-which rang through the brains even of us who heard the words addressed to another.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. Lucy Westenra, in her undead form, appears to Arthur Holmwood and his friends when they visit her tomb to free her soul. They shudder with horror at the sight of the devilish vampire, that once was the pure and innocent Lucy. Dracula has now turned her into a predatory, highly sexual creature.

As for Arthur, he seemed under a spell; moving his hands from his face, he opened wide his arms. She was leaping for them, when Van Helsing sprang forward and held between them his little golden crucifix. She recoiled from it, and, with a suddenly distorted face, full of rage, dashed past him as if to enter the tomb.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. When Lucy appears as a voluptuous and sexy vampire to Arthur Holmwood and the others, Arthur is passively drawn to the creature who beckons him to come with her. That is until Van Helsing intervenes with his crucifix to repel her.

But of the most blessed of all, when this now Un-Dead be made to rest as true dead, then the soul of the poor lady whom we love shall again be free. Instead of working wickedness by night and growing more debased in the assimilating of it by day, she shall take her place with the other Angels.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. Van Helsing to Arthur Holmwood, on freeing Lucy Westenra from her undead vampire state and re-uniting her soul with God. The purpose of killing Lucy is to restore her purity and make her one with God.

The thing in the coffin writhed, and a hideous, blood-curdling screech came from the opened red lips. The body shook and quivered and twisted in wild contortions. The sharp white teeth champed together till the lips were cut, and the mouth was smeared with a crimson foam. But Arthur never faltered. He looked like a figure of Thor as his untrembling arm rose and fell, driving deeper and deeper the mercy-bearing stake.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 16. In one of the most disconcerting scenes in the novel, Arthur Holmwood drives a stake through the undead vampire Lucy’s heart before she is beheaded and her mouth filled with garlic. Arthur was Lucy’s fiancé while she lived and the four men present agree that he is the right person for the job. There is a heavy sexual symbolism to this scene, with the stake representing a phallic symbol. Bodily fluids flow in the form of blood from Lucy’s heart. The beautiful and innocent Lucy Westenra was the evil Dracula’s first victim in England. The vampire hunters carry out their ritual on Lucy to save her soul.

The nosferatu do not die like the bee when he sting once. He is only stronger; and being stronger, have yet more power to work evil. This vampire which is amongst us is of himself so strong in person as twenty men; he is of cunning more than mortal, for his cunning be the growth of ages.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 18. Prof. Van Helsing is the only one in the novel that appears to have the knowledge and expertise to defeat and destroy Dracula. He warns the others of the difficult task ahead against this superhuman creature.

But we are face to face with duty; and in such case must we shrink? For me, I say, no; but then I am old, and life, with his sunshine, his fair places, his song of birds, his music, and his love, lie far behind. You others are young. Some have seen sorrow; but there are fair days yet in store. What say you?

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 18. Van Helsing appeals to the others to join him in his crusade to destroy Dracula. He reminds them of their duty to the greater good and says that he himself is dedicated to the mission.

Well, you know what we have to contend against; but we, too, are not without strength. We have on our side power of combination – a power denied to the vampire kind; we have sources of science; we are free to act and think; and the hours of the day and the night are ours equally. In fact, so far as our powers extend, they are unfettered, and we are free to use them. We have self-devotion in a cause, and an end to achieve which is not a selfish one. These things are much.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 18. Scientist and vampire killer Abraham Van Helsing offers hope to his fellow Dracula hunters, promising that modern science gives them power and hope in their fight against the evil Count.

If it be so, then was he no common man; for in that time, and for centuries after, he was spoken of as the cleverest and the most cunning, as well as the bravest of the sons of the "land beyond the forest." That mighty brain and that iron resolution went with him to his grave, and are even now arrayed against us.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 18. Prof. Van Helsing describes Dracula before he became a vampire. He warns that in the battle between good and evil, they were now facing that formidable intellect and determination the Count had inherited from his previous life.

With his left hand he held both Mrs Harker’s hands, keeping them away with her arms at full tension. His right hand gripped her by the back of the neck, forcing her face down on his bosom. Her white nightdress was smeared with blood, and a thin stream trickled down the man’s bare chest which was shown by his torn-open dress. The attitude of the two had a terrible resemblance to a child forcing a kitten’s nose into a saucer of milk to compel it to drink.

– Bram Stoker

Dracula, Chapter 21. In one of the most horrific scenes in the novel, Mina’s friend Dr. John Seward describes how he and Van Helsing break into Mina’s bedroom one night. Mina is kneeling on the edge of her bed while a tall figure, dressed in black, is bending over her. Mina has been bitten on the neck by Dracula and he is holding her head to a wound in his own chest, forcing her to drink the blood pouring from it. The final simile using the kitten and the child underlines Dracula’s power to take something pure and taint and distort it. The attack on Mina is viewed as a form of rape.
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