Literary Quotes

I know I will always be attracted to the unknown as it does often verify what I am or what else I could be.

Hollace M. Metzger

I wanted to convince you that you must learn to make every act count, since you are going to be here for only a short while, in fact, too short for witnessing all the marvels of it.

Carlos Castaneda

This was a lucky recollection -- it saved her from something like regret.

Jane Austen

I knew that I had come face to face with some one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself.

Oscar Wilde

The shades of night were falling fast,As though an Alpine village passedA youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,A banner with the strange device,Excelsior!His brow was sad; his eye beneath,Flashed like a falchion from its sheath,And like a silver clarion rungThe accents of that unknown tongue,Excelsior!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Exce

Avarice, envy, pride,Three fatal sparks, have set the hearts of allOn Fire.

Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy,

The dancing pair that simply sought renown,By holding out to tire each other down;The swain mistrustless of his smutted face,While secret laughter titter'd round the place;The bashful virgin's side-long looks of love,The matrons glance that would those looks reprove:These were thy charms, sweet village; sports like these,With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please;These were thy bowers their cheerful influence shed,These were thy charms -- but all these charms are fled.

Oliver Goldsmith, Deserted Villa

Hither the heroes and nymphs resort,To taste awhile the pleasures of a court;In various talk th' instuctive hours they past,Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last;One speaks the glory of the British Queen,And one describes a charming Indian screenA third interprets motions, looks and eyes;At every word a reputation dies.

Alexander Pope, The Rape of the

The great Creator to revereMust sure become the creature;But still the preaching cant forbear,And ev'n the rigid feature:Yet ne'er with wits profane to rangeBe complaisance extended;An atheist laugh's a poor exchangeFor deity offended.

Robert Burns, Epistle to a Young

O, thou hast damnable iteration, and art, indeed, able to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me, Hal; God forgive thee for it! Before I knew thee, Hal, I knew nothing; and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give it over; by the Lord, an I do not, I am a villain: I'll be damn'd for never a king's son in Christendom.Falstaff speaking to Prince Henry

William Shakespeare, King Henry

The people have a right supremeTo make their kings, for Kings are made for them.All Empire is no more than Pow'r in Trust,Which when resum'd, can be no longer just.Successionm for the general good design'd,In its own wrong a Nation cannot bind.

John Dryden, Absalom and Achitop

But wherefore thou alone? Wherefore with theeCame not all hell broke loose? Is pain to themLess pain, less to be fled, or thou than theyLess hardy to endure? Courageous chief,The first in flight from pain, hadst thou allegedTo thy deserted host this cause of flight,Thou surely hadst not come sole fugitive.

John Milton, Paradise Lost

'Tis an old saying, the Devil lurks behind the cross. All is not gold that glitters. From the tail of the plough, Bamba was made King of Spain; and from his silks and riches was Rodrigo cast to be devoured by the snakes.

Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote

At last is Hector stretch'd upon the plain,Who fear'd no vengeance for Patroclus slain:Then, Prince! You should have fear'd, what now you feel;Achilles absent was Achilles still:Yet a short space the great avenger stayed,Then low in dust thy strength and glory laid.

Homer, Iliad, The

Through me you pass into the city of woe:Through me you pass into eternal pain:Through me among the people lost for aye.Justice the founder of my fabric moved:To rear me was the task of power divine,Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.Before me things create were none, save thingsEternal, and eternal I shall endure.All hope abandon, ye who enter here.

Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy,

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever!A farewell, and then forever!Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee,Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.Who shall say that Fortune grieves him,While the star of hope she leaves him?Me, nae cheerful twinkle lights me,Dark despair around benights me.

Robert Burns, Ae Fond Kiss

In words as fashions the same rule will hold,Alike fantastic if too new or old:Be not the first by whome the new are tried,Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.

William Shakespeare

It was a pleasant caf

Ernest Hemingway

All women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn, for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds.

Virginia Woolf

Accuse not nature, she hath done her part;Do thou but thine, and be not diffidentOf wisdom, she deserts thee not, if thouDismiss not her, when most thou needest her nigh,By attributing overmuch to thingsLess excellent, as thou thyself perceivest.

William Shakespeare