Quotes by Byron, Lord

"Poetry should only occupy the idle."

Byron, Lord on poetry and poets   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"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   

"A bargain is in its very essence a hostile transaction do not all men try to abate the price of all they buy? I contend that a bargain even between brethren is a declaration of war."

Byron, Lord on bargains   

"I like his holiness very much, particularly since an order, which I understand he has lately given, that no more miracles shall be performed."

Byron, Lord on pope   

"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   

"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   

"This sort of adoration of the real is but a heightening of the beau ideal."

Byron, Lord on reality   

"My attachment has neither the blindness of the beginning, nor the microscopic accuracy of the close of such liaisons."

Byron, Lord on relationship   

"I am always most religious upon a sunshiny day..."

Byron, Lord on religion   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"The beginning of atonement is the sense of its necessity."

Byron, Lord on repentance
3 fans of this quote   

"The king-times are fast finishing. There will be blood shed like water, and tears like mist; but the peoples will conquer in the end. I shall not live to see it, but I foresee it."

Byron, Lord on republican   

"The dead have been awakened -- shall I sleep? The world's at war with tyrants -- shall I crouch? the harvest's ripe -- and shall I pause to reap? I slumber not; the thorn is in my couch; Each day a trumpet soundeth in mine ear, its echo in my heart."

Byron, Lord on evolution   

"They never fail who die in a great cause."

Byron, Lord on sacrifice   

"Fools are my theme, let satire be my song."

Byron, Lord on sarcasm   

"Science is but the exchange of ignorance for that which is another kind of ignorance."

Byron, Lord on science   

"I should like to know who has been carried off, except poor dear me -- I have been more ravished myself than anybody since the Trojan war."

Byron, Lord on seduction   

"Self-love for ever creeps out, like a snake, to sting anything which happens to stumble upon it."

Byron, Lord on love   

"It is true from early habit, one must make love mechanically as one swims; I was once very fond of both, but now as I never swim unless I tumble into the water, I don't make love till almost obliged."

Byron, Lord on sex   

"Sincerity may be humble, but she cannot be servile."

Byron, Lord on sincerity
3 fans of this quote   

"If I am fool, it is, at least, a doubting one; and I envy no one the certainty of his self-approved wisdom."

Byron, Lord on skepticism   

"There is something pagan in me that I cannot shake off. In short, I deny nothing, but doubt everything."

Byron, Lord on skepticism   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Sleep hath its own world, and a wide realm of wild reality. And dreams in their development have breath, and tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy."

Byron, Lord on sleep
3 fans of this quote   

"Smiles form the channel of a future tear."

Byron, Lord on smile   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"I only go out to get me a fresh appetite for being alone."

Byron, Lord on socializing and socialism   

"Society is now one polished horde, formed of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored."

Byron, Lord on society
3 fans of this quote   

"In solitude, where we are least alone."

Byron, Lord on solitude
8 fans of this quote   

"The busy have no time for tears."

Byron, Lord on sorrow
7 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life."

Byron, Lord on sorrow
8 fans of this quote   

"The Cardinal is at his wit's end -- it is true that he had not far to go."

Byron, Lord on stupidity   

"All are inclined to believe what they covet, from a lottery-ticket up to a passport to Paradise."

Byron, Lord on belief   

"Dreading that climax of all human ills the inflammation of his weekly bills."

Byron, Lord on bills   

"Here lies interred in the eternity of the past, from whence there is no resurrection for the days -- whatever there may be for the dust -- the thirty-third year of an ill-spent life, which, after a lingering disease of many months sank into a lethargy, and expired, January 22d, 1821, A.D. leaving a successor inconsolable for the very loss which occasioned its existence."

Byron, Lord on birthdays
3 fans of this quote   

"'Tis pleasant, sure, to see one's name in print; A book's a book, although there's nothing in it."

Byron, Lord on books - reading   

"The reading or non-reading a book will never keep down a single petticoat."

Byron, Lord on books - reading   

"It is by far the most elegant worship, hardly excepting the Greek mythology. What with incense, pictures, statues, altars, shrines, relics, and the real presence, confession, absolution, -- there is something sensible to grasp at. Besides, it leaves no possibility of doubt; for those who swallow their Deity, really and truly, in transubstantiation, can hardly find any thing else otherwise than easy of digestion."

Byron, Lord on catholicism   

"The lapse of ages changes all things -- time, language, the earth, the bounds of the sea, the stars of the sky, and every thing about, around, and underneath man, except man himself."

Byron, Lord on change   

"Out of chaos God made a world, and out of high passions comes a people."

Byron, Lord on chaos   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"For in itself a thought, a slumbering thought, is capable of years, and curdles a long life into one hour."

Byron, Lord on thoughts and thinking   

"The power of thought, the magic of the mind."

Byron, Lord on thoughts and thinking
4 fans of this quote