For most men (till by losing rendered sager)
Will back their own opinions by a wager.
Quotations by:
Byron, George Gordon, Lord
Then he was faithful too, as well as amorous;
So that no sort of female could complain,
Although they’re now and then a little clamourous,
He never put the pretty souls in pain;
His heart was one of those which most enamour us,
Wax to receive, and marble to retain:
He was a lover of the good old school,
Who still become more constant as they cool.
I love the language, that soft bastard Latin,
Which melts like kisses from a female mouth,
And sounds as if it should be writ on satin,
With syllables which breathe of the sweet South,
And gentle liquids gliding all so pat in,
That not a single accent seems uncouth,
Like our harsh northern whistling, grunting guttural,
Which we’re obliged to hiss, and spit, and sputter all.
“Thalaba,” Mr. Southey’s second poem, is written in open defiance of precedent and poetry. Mr. S. wished to produce something novel, and succeeded to a miracle. “Joan of Arc” was marvelous enough, but “Thalaba” was one of those poems “which,” in the words of Porson, “will be read when Homer and Virgil are forgotten, but — not till then.”
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” footnote to l. 205 (1809)
(Source)
When one of his earlier works was harshly criticized in the Edinburgh Review, Byron wrote this poem satirizing such critics (and the poetry they like). He refers to Robert Southey's "Thalaba," bringing in a phrase used by classical scholar Richard Porson to refer to Southey's poem "Madoc". Except ...
... Porson doesn't include the "but not till then" phrase in his original comment. A man of subtle but biting humor, it seems likely he intended that as a subversive but deniable reading of "when Homer and Virgil are forgotten". Believing that, multiple writers of the time in turn criticized Byron for crudely spelling out Porson's bon mot (examples: Timbs (1862), Powell/Rogers (1903)).
Prepare for rhyme — I’ll publish, right or wrong:
Fools are my theme, let Satire be my song.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” l. 5ff (1809)
(Source)
A man must serve his time to every trade
Save Censure — Critics all are ready made.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” l. 63ff (1809)
(Source)
‘Tis pleasant, sure, to see one’s name in print;
A Book’s a Book, altho’ there’s nothing in’t.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” l. 51ff (1809)
(Source)
With just enough of learning to misquote.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” l. 66ff (1809)
(Source)
Near this spot
are deposited the Remains of one
who possessed Beauty without Vanity,
Strength without Insolence,
Courage without Ferocity,
and all the Virtues of Man without his Vices.
This Praise, which would be unmeaning Flattery
if inscribed over human Ashes,
is but a just tribute to the Memory of
BOATSWAIN, a DOGGeorge Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“Epitaph to a Dog” (1808)
(Source)
Carved on the headstone over Boatswain's grave at Newstead Abbey, the family's ancestral home. Byron acquired the dog at age fifteen; Boatswain died of rabies, an endemic disease in England at the time, five years later. Byron wanted to be buried beside him, but the sale of the property made that impossible.
While the rest of the poem is considered Byron's, these first lines may have been written by his friend, John Cam Hobhouse. More discussion here.
Friendship is Love without his wings!
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“L’Amitié est l’Amour sans Ailes” (1806-12-29, publ. 1832)
(Source)
This phrase (which is the translation of the title), or variants of it, are the final line to each stanza of the poem.
Sometimes paraphrased "Friendship is Love without wings."
Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal truth,
The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“Manfred,” Act 1, sc. 1 [Manfred] (1817)
(Source)
Knowledge is not happiness, and science
But an exchange of ignorance for that
Which is another kind of ignorance.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“Manfred,” Act 2, sc. 4 [First Destiny] (1817)
(Source)
And if we do but watch the hour,
There never yet was human power
Which could evade, if unforgiven,
The patient search and vigil long
Of him who treasures up a wrong.
It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale’s high note is heard;
It is the hour when lovers’ vows
Seem sweet in every whisper’d word.
Titan! to whom immortal eyes
The sufferings of mortality
Seen in their sad reality,
Were not as things that gods despise;
What was thy pity’s recompense?
A silent suffering, and intense;
The rock, the vulture, and the chain,
All that the proud can feel of pain,
The agony they do not show,
The suffocating sense of woe,
Which speaks but in its loneliness,
And then is jealous lest the sky
Should have a listener, nor will sigh
Until its voice is echoless.
Titan! to thee the strife was given
Between the suffering and the will,
Which torture where they cannot kill;
And the inexorable Heaven,
And the deaf tyranny of Fate,
The ruling principle of Hate,
Which for its pleasure doth create
The things it may annihilate,
Refused thee even the boon to die:
The wretched gift Eternity
Was thine — and thou hast borne it well.
A mighty lesson we inherit:
Thou art a symbol and a sign
To Mortals of their fate and force;
Like thee, Man is in part divine,
A troubled stream from a pure source.
Thy Godlike crime was to be kind,
To render with thy precepts less
The sum of human wretchedness,
And strengthen Man with his own mind.
And Man in portions can foresee
His own funereal destiny;
His wretchedness, and his resistance,
And his sad unallied existence:
To which his Spirit may oppose
Itself — and equal to all woes,
And a firm will, and a deep sense,
Which even in torture can decry
Its own concenter’d recompense,
Triumphant where it dares defy,
And making Death a Victory.
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow’d to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“She Walks in Beauty,” st. 1 (1814), Hebrew Melodies (1815)
(Source)
So, we’ll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And love itself have rest.Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we’ll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“So We’ll Go No More A-Roving” (1817)
(Source)
Included in a letter to his friend Thomas Moore (28 Feb 1817), in which he complained he'd been up too late on too many night during the Carnival in Venice.
There’s not a joy the world can give like that it takes away.
So gleams the past, the light of other days,
Which shines, but warms not with its powerless rays.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“Sun of the Sleepless!” Hebrew Melodies (1815)
(Source)
The “good old times” — all times when old are good —
Are gone.
Mark! where his carnage and his conquests cease!
He makes a solitude, and calls it — peace!George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“The Bride of Abydos,” canto 2, st. 20 (1813)
(Source)
Adaptation from Tacitus' Agricola.
She was his life,
The ocean to the river of his thoughts,
Which terminated all.
For Freedom’s battle once begun,
Bequeathed by bleeding Sire to Son,
Though baffled oft is ever won.
Better to sink beneath the shock
Than moulder piecemeal on the rock!
But ye — who never felt a single thought
For what our Morals are to be, or ought;
Who wisely wish the charms you view to reap,
Say — would you make those beauties quite so cheap?
Hot from the hands promiscuously applied,
Round the slight waist, or down the glowing side,
Where were the rapture then to clasp the form
From this lewd grasp and lawless contact warm?George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“The Waltz,” l. 230ff (1813)
(Source)
The new dance was considered something of a scandal, given its contact between male and female dancers. Published anonymously by Byron.
Here’s a sigh to those who love me,
And a smile to those who hate;
And, whatever sky’s above me,
Here’s a heart for every fate.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“To Thomas Moore,” st. 2. (1817)
(Source)
First published in The Traveller (1821-01-08).
Always laugh when you can; it is cheap medicine.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
(Attributed)
Widely attributed to Byron, but no source cited.
He who is only just is cruel. Who on earth could live were all judged justly?
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Arino Faliero, Doge of Venice, Act 5, sc. 1 [Angiolina] (1820)
(Source)
I live,
But live to die: and, living, see no thing
To make death hateful, save an innate clinging,
A loathsome and yet all invincible
Instinct of life, which I abhor, as I
Despise myself, yet cannot overcome —
And so I live. Would I had never lived!
Because
He is all-powerful, must all-good, too, follow?
I judge but by the fruits — and they are bitter —
Which I must feed on for a fault not mine.
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 2, st. 76 (1818)
(Source)
None are so desolate but something dear,
Dearer than self, possesses or possess’d
A thought, and claims the homage of a tear.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 2, st. 24 (1812)
(Source)
Fair Greece! sad relic of departed Worth!
Immortal, though no more; though fallen, great!George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 2, st. 73 (1812)
(Source)
On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;
No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 3, st. 22 (1818)
(Source)
There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 4, st. 178 (1818)
(Source)
Who knows whether, when a comet shall approach this globe to destroy it, as it often has been and will be destroyed, men will not tear rocks from their foundations by means of steam, and hurl mountains, as the giants are said to have done, against the flaming mass? — and then we shall have traditions of Titans again, and of wars with Heaven.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Conversations of Lord Byron with Thomas Medwin, Vol. 2 (1832)
(Source)
What men call gallantry, and gods adultery,
Is much more common where the climate’s sultry.
Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they did.
‘Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog’s honest bark
Bay deep-mouth’d welcome as we draw near home;
‘Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark
Our coming, and look brighter when we come.
‘T is pity though, in this sublime world, that
Pleasure’s a sin, and sometimes sin’s a pleasure.
But now at thirty years my hair is gray ––
(I wonder what it will be like at forty?
I thought of a peruke the other day)
My heart is not much greener; and, in short, I
Have squander’d my whole summer while ’twas May,
And feel no more the spirit to retort; I
Have spent my life, both interest and principal,
And deem not, what I deem’d, my soul invincible.
My days of love are over; me no more
The charms of maid, wife, and still less of widow,
Can make the fool of which they made before, —
In short, I must not lead the life I did do;
The credulous hope of mutual minds is o’er,
The copious use of claret is forbid too,
So for a good old-gentlemanly vice,
I think I must take up with avarice.
What is the end of Fame? ’tis but to fill
A certain portion of uncertain paper:
Some liken it to climbing up a hill,
Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in vapour;
For this men write, speak, preach, and heroes kill,
And bards burn what they call their “midnight taper,”
To have, when the original is dust,
A name, a wretched picture, and worse bust.
But man is a carnivorous production,
And must have meals, at least one meal a day;
He cannot live, like woodcocks, upon suction,
But, like the shark and tiger, must have prey;
Although his anatomical construction
Bears vegetables, in a grumbling way,
Your labouring people think beyond all question,
Beef, veal, and mutton, better for digestion.
Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter,
Sermons and soda water the day after.
Man, being reasonable, must get drunk;
The best of life is but intoxication;
Glory, the grape, love, gold, in these are sunk
The hopes of all men, and of every nation.
All tragedies are finish’d by a death,
All comedies are ended by a marriage;
The future states of both are left to faith.
The Isles of Greece, the Isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,
Where grew the arts of war and peace,
Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Don Juan, Canto 3, st. 86a “The Isles of Greece,” st. 1 (1821)
(Source)
But words are things, and a small drop of ink,
Falling like dew, upon a thought, produces
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think.
Nothing so difficult as a beginning
In poesy, unless perhaps the end.
These two hated with a hate
Found only on the stage.
And if I laugh at any mortal thing,
‘Tis that I may not weep.
There’s not a sea the passenger e’er pukes in,
Turns up more dangerous breakers than the Euxine.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Don Juan, Canto 5, st. 5 (1821)
(Source)
The Euxine is the Black Sea, from the Greek Pontos Euxeinos, which means (ironically) "the hospitable sea."
But I digress: of all appeals, — although
I grant the power of pathos, and of gold,
Of beauty, flattery, threats, a shilling, — no
Method’s more sure at moments to take hold
Of the best feelings of mankind, which grow
More tender, as we every day behold,
Than that all-softening, overpowering knell,
The tocsin of the soul — the dinner-bell.
Polygamy may well be held in dread,
Not only as a sin, but as a bore:
Most wise men, with one moderate woman wed,
Will scarcely find philosophy for more.
But ne’ertheless I hope it is no crime
To laugh at all things — for I wish to know
What, after all, are all things — but a show?
‘Twas blow for blow, disputing inch by inch,
For one would not retreat, nor t’other flinch.
And I will war, at least in words (and — should
My chance so happen — deeds), with all who war
With Thought; — and of Thought’s foes by far most rude,
Tyrants and sycophants have been and are.
I know not who may conquer: if I could
Have such a prescience, it should be no bar
To this my plain, sworn, downright detestation
Of every despotism in every nation.
I wish men to be free
As much from mobs as kings — from you as me.
As fall the dews on quenchless sands,
Blood only serves to wash Ambition’s hands!
And, after all, what is a lie? ‘T is but
The truth in masquerade; and I defy
Historians, heroes, lawyers. priests, to put
A fact without some leaven of a lie.
I may stand alone,
But would not change my free thoughts for a throne.
Our hair
Grows grizzled, and we are not what we were.
Yes! ready money is Aladdin’s lamp.
Of all the horrid, hideous notes of woe,
Sadder than owl songs or the midnight blast,
Is that portentous phrase, “I told you so,”
Utter’d by friends, those prophets of the past,
Who, ‘stead of saying what you now should do,
Own they foresaw that you would fall at last.
‘T is strange — but true; for truth is always strange;
Stranger than fiction; if it could be told,
How much would novels gain by the exchange!
How differently the world would men behold!George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Don Juan, Canto 14, st. 101 (1823)
(Source)
Apparent origin of the phrase "Truth is stranger than fiction."
How little do we know that which we are!
How less what we may be!
“Yet doth he live!” exclaims th’ impatient heir,
And sighs for sables which he must not wear.
You have deeply ventured;
But all must do so who would greatly win.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Marino Faliero, Doge of Venice, Act 1, sc. 1 [Doge] (1821)
(Source)
He who is only just is cruel; who
Upon the earth would live were all judged justly?George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Marino Faliero, Doge of Venice, Act 5, sc. 1 [Angiolina] (1821)
(Source)
They never fail who die
In a great cause.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Marino Faliero, Act 2, sc. 2 [Israel Bertuccio] (1821)
(Source)
The power of Thought, — the magic of the Mind!
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Corsair, Canto 1, st. 8, l. 184 (1814)
(Source)
The abilities -- plus success -- that Conrad uses to control his crew.
Farewell!
For in that word — that fatal word — howe’er
We promise — hope — believe, — here breathes despair.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Corsair, Canto 1, st. 15, l. 86ff (1814)
(Source)
By those, that deepest feel, are ill exprest
The indistinctness of the suffering breast;
Where thousand thoughts begin to end in one,
Which seeks from all the refuge found in none;
No words suffice the secret soul to show.
And Truth denies all eloquence to Woe.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Corsair, Canto 3, st. 22, l. 1807ff (1814)
(Source)
He drinks — but what’s drinking?
A mere pause from thinking!George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Deformed Transformed, Part 3, sc. 1 [Caesar] (1822)
(Source)
Singing of veterans after the war, in peacetime.
Sorrow preys upon
Its solitude, and nothing diverts it
From its sad visions of the other world
Than calling it at moments back to this.
The busy have no time for tears.George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
The Two Foscari, Act 4, sc. 1 [Loredano] (1821)
(Source)
A goodly fellow by his looks, though worn
As most good fellows are, by pain or pleasure,
Which tear life out of us before our time;
I scarce know which most quickly: but he seems
To have seen better days, as who has not
Who has seen yesterday?
If I valued fame, I should flatter received opinions, which have gathered strength by time, and will yet wear longer than any living works to the contrary. But, for the soul of me, I cannot and will not give the lie to my own thoughts and doubts, come what may. If I am fool, it is, at least, a doubting one; and I envy no one the certainty of his self-approved wisdom.
I fear one lies more to one’s self than to anyone else.
Opinions are made to be changed — or how is truth to be got at?
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Letter to John Murray (9 May 1818)
We are all selfish and I no more trust myself than others with a good motive.
George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Letter to Lady Melbourne (28 Sep 1813)
To do good to mankind is the chivalrous plan,
And is always as nobly requited;
Then battle for freedom wherever you can.
And, if not shot or hang’d, you’ll get knighted.