Charles Lamb Quotes

Tis unpleasant to meet a beggar. It is painful to deny him; and, if you relieve him, it is so much out of your pocket.

A man may do very well with a very little knowledge, and scarce be found out in mixed company; everybody is so much more ready to produce his own, than to call for a display of your acquisitions.

Man, while he loves, is never quite depraved.

We were happier when we were poorer, but we were also younger.

Do not fold, spindle or mutilate.

If thou would'st have me sing and play As once I play'd and sung, First take this time-worn lute away, And bring one freshly strung.

Be not frightened at the hard words "imposition," "imposture;" give and ask no questions. Cast thy bread upon the waters. Some have, unawares, entertained angels.

Can we ring the bells backward? Can we unlearn the arts that pretend to civilize, and then burn the world? There is a march of science; but who shall beat the drums for its retreat?

Reader, if you are gifted with nerves like mine, aspire to any character but that of a wit.

I have passed all my days in London, until I have formed as many and intense local attachments as any of you mountaineers can have done with dead nature.

The drinking man is never less himself than during his sober intervals.

Damn the age. I'll write for antiquity.

Since all the maids are good and lovable, from whence come the bad wives?

I could never hate anyone I knew.

Merit, God knows, is very little rewarded.

Were I Diogenes, I would not move out of a kilderkin into a hogshead, though the first had had nothing but small beer in it, and the second reeked claret.

What have I gained by health? Intolerable dullness. What by mode meals? A total blank.

Wert thou all that I wish thee, great, glorious, and free, First flower of the earth and first gem of the sea.

No eye to watch, and no tongue to wound us, All earth forgot, and all heaven around us.

And when once the young heart of a maiden is stolen, The maiden herself will steal after it soon.

If dirt were trumps, what hands you would hold!

Cultivate simplicity, Coleridge.

I have something more to do than to feel.

I have done all that I came into this world to do. I have worked task work, and have the rest of the day to myself.

All people have their blind side-their superstitions.

There are like to be short graces where the devil plays host.

You may derive thoughts from others; your way of thinking, the mould in which your thoughts are cast, must be your own.

The only true time which a man can properly call his own, is that which he has all to himself; the rest, though in some sense he may be said to live it, is other people's time, not his.

Whose wit in the combat, as gentle as bright, Ne'er carried a heart-stain away on its blade.

When thus the heart is in a vein Of tender thought, the simplest strain Can touch it with peculiar power.

I give thee all,-I can no more, Though poor the off'ring be; My heart and lute are all the store That I can bring to thee.

Who has not felt how sadly sweet The dream of home, the dream of home, Steals o'er the heart, too soon to fleet, When far o'er sea or land we roam?

I like you and your book, ingenious Hone! In whose capacious all-embracing leaves The very marrow of tradition 's shown; And all that history, much that fiction weaves.

Sassafras wood boiled down to a kind of tea, and tempered with an infusion of milk and sugar hath to some a delicacy beyond the China luxury.

The English writer, Charles Lamb, said one day: "I hate that man." "But you don't know him." "Of course, I don't," said Lamb. "Do you think I could possibly hate a man I know?"

Oh stay! oh stay! Joy so seldom weaves a chain Like this to-night, that oh 't is pain To break its links so soon.

To sigh, yet feel no pain; To weep, yet scarce know why; To sport an hour with Beauty's chain, Then throw it idly by.

In some respects the better a book is, the less it demands from the binding.

A child's nature is too serious a thing to admit of its being regarded as a mere appendage to another being.

In every thing that relates to science, I am a whole Encyclopaedia behind the rest of the world.

Science has succeeded to poetry, no less in the little walks of children than with men. Is there no possibility of averting this sore evil?

The good things of life are not to be had singly, but come to us with a mixture; like a school-boy's holiday, with a task affixed to the tail of it.

Separate from the pleasure of your company, I don't much care if I never see another mountain in my life.

'T is sweet to think that where'er we rove We are sure to find something blissful and dear; And that when we 're far from the lips we love, We 've but to make love to the lips we are near.

When twilight dews are falling soft Upon the rosy sea, love, I watch the star whose beam so oft Has lighted me to thee, love.

There was a little man, and he had a little soul; And he said, Little Soul, let us try, try, try!

She unbent her mind afterwards - over a book.

When true hearts lie wither'd And fond ones are flown, Oh, who would inhabit This bleak world alone?

Books which are no books.

Presents, I often say, endear absents.