Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Errors like straws upon the surface flow, Who would search for pearls to be grateful for often must dive below.
It is madness to make fortune the mistress of events, because by herself she is nothing and is ruled by prudence.
Beauty is nothing else but a just accord and mutual harmony of the members, animated by a healthful constitution.
When he spoke, what tender words he used! So softly, that like flakes of feathered snow, They melted as they fell.
Fool that I was, upon my eagle's wings I bore this wren, till I was tired with soaring, and now he mounts above me.
I maintain, against the enemies of the stage, that patterns of piety, decently represented, may second the precepts.
When we view elevated ideas of Nature, the result of that view is admiration, which is always the cause of pleasure.
Fortune, that with malicious joyDoes man her slave oppress,Proud of her office to destroy,Is seldom pleasd to bless.
What precious drops are those, Which silently each other's track pursue, Bright as young diamonds in their faint dew?
I am as free as nature first made man, Ere the base laws of servitude began, When wild in woods the noble savage ran.
What I have left is from my native spring; I've still a heart that swells, in scorn of fate, And lifts me to my banks.
If you be pungent, be brief; for it is with words as with sunbeams - the more they are condensed the deeper they burn.
If thou dost still retain the same ill habits, the same follies, too, still thou art bound to vice, and still a slave.
Virgil, above all poets, had a stock which I may call almost inexhaustible, of figurative, elegant, and sounding words.
If one must be rejected, one succeed, make him my lord within whose faithful breast is fixed my image, and who loves me best.
Men are but children of a larger growth, Our appetites as apt to change as theirs, And full as craving too, and full as vain.
Ah, how sweet it is to love! Ah, how gay is young Desire! And what pleasing pains we prove When we first approach Love's fire!
But when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.
I feel my sinews slackened with the fright, and a cold sweat trills down all over my limbs, as if I were dissolving into water.
Great souls forgive not injuries till time has put their enemies within their power, that they may show forgiveness is their own.
The propriety of thoughts and words, which are the hidden beauties of a play, are but confusedly judged in the vehemence of action.
Shakespeare was naturally learned; he needed not the spectacles of the books to read nature; he looked inward, and found her there.
We can never be grieved for their miseries who are thoroughly wicked, and have thereby justly called their calamities on themselves.
With odorous oil thy head and hair are sleek; And then thou kemb'st the tuzzes on thy cheek: Of these, my barbers take a costly care.
Raw in the fields the rude militia swarms, Mouth without hands; maintained at vast expense, In peace a charge, in war a weak defence.
It is a madness to make fortune the mistress of events, because in herself she is nothing, can rule nothing, but is ruled by prudence.
Every language is so full of its own proprieties that what is beautiful in one is often barbarous, nay, sometimes nonsense, in another.
Dreams are but interludes that fancy makes... Sometimes forgotten things, long cast behind Rush forward in the brain, and come to mind.
Discover the opinion of your enemies, which is commonly the truest; for they will give you no quarter, and allow nothing to complaisance.
Jealousy's a proof of love, But 'tis a weak and unavailing medicine; It puts out the disease and makes it show, But has no power to cure.
Seas are the fields of combat for the winds; but when they sweep along some flowery coast, their wings move mildly, and their rage is lost.
He is the very Janus of poets; he wears almost everywhere two faces; and you have scarce begun to admire the one, ere you despise the other.
Democracy is essentially anti-authoritarian--that is, it not only demands the right but imposes the responsibility of thinking for ourselves.
Sure there is none but fears a future state; And when the most obdurate swear they do not, Their trembling hearts belie their boasting tongues.
Welcome, thou kind deceiver! Thou best of thieves; who, with an easy key, Dost open life, and, unperceived by us, Even steal us from ourselves.
Happy the man, and happy he alone, he who can call today his own; he who, secure within, can say, tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
I am resolved to grow fat and look young till forty, and then slip out of the world with the first wrinkle and the reputation of five-and-twenty.
If all the world be worth thy winning. / Think, oh think it worth enjoying: / Lovely Thaïs sits beside thee, / Take the good the gods provide thee.
They, who would combat general authority with particular opinion, must first establish themselves a reputation of understanding better than other men.
For my part, I can compare her (a gossip) to nothing but the sun; for, like him, she knows no rest, nor ever sets in one place but to rise in another.
Faith is to believe what you do not yet see: the reward for this faith is to see what you believe. Thus all below is strength, and all above is grace.
Virtue without success is a fair picture shown by an ill light; but lucky men are favorites of heaven; all own the chief, when fortune owns the cause.
None, none descends into himself, to find The secret imperfections of his mind: But every one is eagle-ey'd to see Another's faults, and his deformity.
The province of the soul is large enough to fill up every cranny of your time, and leave you much to answer for if one wretch be damned by your neglect.
Shakespeare was the Homer, or father of our dramatic poets;Jonson was theVirgil, the pattern of elaborate writing; I admire him, but I love Shakespeare.
My heart's so full of joy, That I shall do some wild extravagance Of love in public; and the foolish world, Which knows not tenderness, will think me mad.
Inspire the Vocal Brass, Inspire; The World is past its Infant Age: Arms and Honour, Arms and Honour, Set the Martial Mind on Fire, And kindle Manly Rage.
And nobler is a limited command, Given by the love of all your native land, Than a successive title, long and dark, Drawn from the mouldy rolls of Noah's Ark.
I strongly wish for what I faintly hope; like the daydreams of melancholy men, I think and think in things impossible, yet love to wander in that golden maze.
By education most have been misled; So they believe, because they were bred. The priest continues where the nurse began, And thus the child imposes on the man.