"Bardot, Byron, Hitler, Hemingway, Monroe, Sade: we do not require our heroes to be subtle, just to be big. Then we can depend on someone to make them subtle."

Enright, D. J. on heroes and heroism   

"Like the measles, love is most dangerous when it comes late in life."

Byron, Lord on love
13 fans of this quote   

"Lovers may be -- and indeed generally are -- enemies, but they never can be friends, because there must always be a spice of jealousy and a something of Self in all their speculations."

Byron, Lord on love
4 fans of this quote   

"All tragedies are finished by a death, all comedies by a marriage."

Byron, Lord on marriage
6 fans of this quote   

"There is something to me very softening in the presence of a woman, some strange influence, even if one is not in love with them, which I cannot at all account for, having no very high opinion of the sex. But yet, I always feel in better humor with myself and every thing else, if there is a woman within ken."

Byron, Lord on women
3 fans of this quote   

"I think the worst woman that ever existed would have made a man of very passable reputation -- they are all better than us and their faults such as they are must originate with ourselves."

Byron, Lord on women
4 fans of this quote   

"We are all selfish and I no more trust myself than others with a good motive."

Byron, Lord on motives
3 fans of this quote   

"As long as I retain my feeling and my passion for Nature, I can partly soften or subdue my other passions and resist or endure those of others."

Byron, Lord on nature
4 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Opinions are made to be changed --or how is truth to be got at?"

Byron, Lord on opinions   

"Though I love my country, I do not love my countrymen."

Byron, Lord on patriotism
4 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Pythagoras, Locke, Socrates -- but pages might be filled up, as vainly as before, with the sad usage of all sorts of sages, who in his life-time, each was deemed a bore! The loftiest minds outrun their tardy ages."

Byron, Lord on philosophers and philosophy   

"As to Don Juan, confess that it is the sublime of that there sort of writing; it may be bawdy, but is it not good English? It may be profligate, but is it not life, is it not the thing? Could any man have written it who has not lived in the world? and tooled in a post-chaise? in a hackney coach? in a Gondola? against a wall? in a court carriage? in a vis a vis? on a table? and under it?"

Byron, Lord on poetry and poets   

"I by no means rank poetry high in the scale of intelligence --this may look like affectation but it is my real opinion. It is the lava of the imagination whose eruption prevents an earthquake."

Byron, Lord on poetry and poets   

"I have simplified my politics into an utter detestation of all existing governments; and, as it is the shortest and most agreeable and summary feeling imaginable, the first moment of an universal republic would convert me into an advocate for single and uncontradicted despotism. The fact is, riches are power, and poverty is slavery all over the earth, and one sort of establishment is no better, nor worse, for a people than another."

Byron, Lord on politics   

"What a strange thing is the propagation of life! A bubble of seed which may be spilt in a whore's lap, or in the orgasm of a voluptuous dream, might (for aught we know) have formed a Caesar or a Bonaparte -- there is nothing remarkable recorded of their sires, that I know of."

Byron, Lord on creation   

"Think not I am what I appear."

Byron, Lord on appearance
6 fans of this quote   

"And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but the truth in masquerade."

Byron, Lord on lies and lying
8 fans of this quote   

"I am about to be married, and am of course in all the misery of a man in pursuit of happiness."

Byron, Lord on engagement
3 fans of this quote   

"Folly loves the martyrdom of fame."

Byron, Lord on fame   

"My great comfort is, that the temporary celebrity I have wrung from the world has been in the very teeth of all opinions and prejudices. I have flattered no ruling powers; I have never concealed a single thought that tempted me."

Byron, Lord on fame   

"Romances I never read like those I have seen."

Byron, Lord on fiction
4 fans of this quote   

"Constancy... that small change of love, which people exact so rigidly, receive in such counterfeit coin, and repay in baser metal."

Byron, Lord on fidelity   

"A mistress never is nor can be a friend. While you agree, you are lovers; and when it is over, anything but friends."

Byron, Lord on friends and friendship
15 fans of this quote   

"I have always laid it down as a maxim --and found it justified by experience --that a man and a woman make far better friendships than can exist between two of the same sex --but then with the condition that they never have made or are to make love to each other."

Byron, Lord on friends and friendship
9 fans of this quote   

"I really cannot know whether I am or am not the Genius you are pleased to call me, but I am very willing to put up with the mistake, if it be one. It is a title dearly enough bought by most men, to render it endurable, even when not quite clearly made out, which it never can be till the Posterity, whose decisions are merely dreams to ourselves, has sanctioned or denied it, while it can touch us no further."

Byron, Lord on genius
4 fans of this quote   

"Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; the best of life is but intoxication."

Byron, Lord on alcohol and alcoholism
7 fans of this quote   

"I cannot help thinking that the menace of Hell makes as many devils as the severe penal codes of inhuman humanity make villains."

Byron, Lord on hell   

"But what is Hope? Nothing but the paint on the face of Existence; the least touch of truth rubs it off, and then we see what a hollow-cheeked harlot we have got hold of."

Byron, Lord on hope
12 fans of this quote   

"Man is born passionate of body, but with an innate though secret tendency to the love of Good in his main-spring of Mind. But God help us all! It is at present a sad jar of atoms."

Byron, Lord on humankind   

"Keep thy smooth words and juggling homilies for those who know thee not."

Byron, Lord on hypocrisy
5 fans of this quote   

"When we think we lead we are most led."

Byron, Lord on leadership
6 fans of this quote   

"I should be very willing to redress men wrongs, and rather check than punish crimes, had not Cervantes, in that all too true tale of Quixote, shown how all such efforts fail."

Byron, Lord on punishment