George Henry Borrow Quotes - Page 1

• George Henry Borrow / Author

We must walk before we run.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Translation is at best an echo.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Two great talkers will not travel far together.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

A losing trade, I assure you, sir: literature is a drug.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Youth will be served, every dog has his day, and mine has been a fine one.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Next to the love of God, the love of country is the best preventive of crime.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

I am invariably of the politics of the people at whose table I sit, or beneath whose roof I sleep.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

There are no countries in the world less known by the British than those selfsame British Islands.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

There is a peculiarity in the countenance, as everybody knows, which, though it cannot be described, is sure to betray the Englishman.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Good ale, the true and proper drink of Englishmen. He is not deserving of the name of Englishman who speaketh against ale, that is good ale.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

If you must commit suicide ... always contrive to do it as decorously as possible; the decencies, whether of life or of death, should never be lost sight of.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

It has been said that idleness is the parent of mischief, which is very true; but mischief itself is merely an attempt to escape from the dreary vacuum of idleness.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Never ride your horse more than five-and-thirty miles a day, always taking more care of him than of yourself; which is right and reasonable, seeing as how the horse is the best animal of the two.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

Sherry...a silly, sickly compound, the use of which will transform a nation, however bold and warlike by nature, into a race of sketchers, scribblers, and punsters, in fact into what Englishmen are at the present day.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

I have always been a friend to hero-worship; it is the only rational one, and has always been in use amongst civilized people - the worship of spirits is synonymous with barbarism - it is mere fetish. ... There is something philosophic in the worship of the heroes of the human race.

• George Henry Borrow / Author

The Germans are the most philosophic people in the world, and the greatest smokers: now I trace their philosophy to their smoking. Smoking has a sedative effect upon the nerves, and enables a man to bear the sorrows of this life (of which every one has his share) not only decently, but dignifiedly.