Quotes, Quotations and Sayings

Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?

To err is human to forgive, divine.

Most women have no characters at all.

Two purposes in human nature rule. Self-love to urge, and reason to restrain.

To err is human; to forgive, divine.

To err is human, to forgive is divine.

Charm strikes the sight, but merit wins the soul.

You beat your Pate, and fancy Wit will come: Knock as you please, there's no body at home.

Fix'd like a plan on his peculiar spot, to draw nutrition, propagate, and rot.

Not to go back is somewhat to advance, and men must walk, at least, before they dance.

Passions are the gales of life.

Like bubbles on the sea of matter borne, They rise, they break, and to that sea return.

The worst of madmen is a saint run mad.

How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense, and love the offender, yet detest the offence?

True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, as those move easiest who have learned to dance. 'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence. The sound must seem an echo to the sense.

Men would be angels, angels would be gods.

Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.

Men dream of courtship, but in wedlock wake.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot? The world forgetting, by the world forgot.

Man never thinks himself happy, but when he enjoys those things which others want or desire.

It is with narrow-souled people as with narrow necked bottles the less they have in them, the more noise they make in pouring it out.

I am more afraid of my own heart than the Pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great Pope, Self.

There are three kinds of despots. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the body. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the soul. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the soul and body alike. The first is called the Prince. The second is called the Pope. The third is called the People.

In every friend we lose a part of ourselves, and the best part.

Curse on all laws, but those that love has made.

Trust not yourself, but your defects to know, make use of every friend and every foe.

I find myself... hoping a total end of all the unhappy divisions of mankind by party-spirit, which at best is but the madness of many for the gain of a few.

Education forms the common mind. Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined.

To err is human, to forgive divine.

When Alexander the Great visited Diogenes and asked whether he could do anything for the famed teacher, Diogenes replied 'Only stand out of my light.' Perhaps some day we shall know how to heighten creativity. Until then, one of the best things we can do for creative men and women is to stand out of their light.

Alexander Graham Bell is alive and well in New York, and still waiting for a dial tone.

On life's vast ocean diversely we sail. Reasons the card, but passion the gale.

Know then this truth, enough for man to know virtue alone is happiness below.

My mother said to me, "If you become a soldier, you'll be a general; if you become a monk, you'll end up as the Pope.

My mother said to me, if you go into the military, you will become a general. If you go into the clergy, you will become Pope. Instead, I became an artist, and I am Piccaso.

When I was a child, my mother said to me, 'If you become a soldier, you'll be a general. If you become a monk you'll end up as the pope. 'Instead I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.

My mother said to me, ''If you become a soldier, you'll be a general; if you become a monk you'll end up as the pope.'' Instead, I became a painter and wound up as Picasso. --Pablo Picasso Never permit a dichotomy to rule your life, a dichotomy in which you hate what you do so you can have pleasure in your spare time. Look for a situation in which your work will give you as much happiness as your spare time.

We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow. Our wiser sons, no doubt will think us so.

Charles V. said that a man who knew four languages was worth four men; and Alexander the Great so valued learning, that he used to say he was more indebted to Aristotle for giving him knowledge that, than his father Philip for giving him life.

Happy the man whose wish and care a few paternal acres bound, content to breathe his native air in his own ground.

Good God! how often are we to die before we go quite off this stage? In every friend we lose a part of ourselves, and the best part.

Fondly we think we honor merit then, When we but praise ourselves in other men.

Fools admire, but men of sense approve.

Alexander received more bravery of mind by the pattern of Achilles, than by hearing the definition of fortitude.

Let me tell you I am better acquainted with you for a long absence, as men are with themselves for a long affliction: absence does but hold off a friend, to make one see him the truer.

Be thou the first true merit to befriend, his praise is lost who stays till all commend.

Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.

Amusement is the happiness of those who cannot think.

Behold the child, by nature's kindly law, pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.

Defoe says that there were a hundred thousand country fellows in his time ready to fight to the death against popery, without knowing whether popery was a man or a horse.