Walter Raleigh Quotes

79 Sourced Quotes

If thy friends be of better quality than thyself, thou mayest be sure of two things; the first, they will be more careful to keep thy counsel, because they have more to lose than thou hast; the second, they will esteem thee for thyself, and not for that which thou dost possess.

Walter Raleigh
No man is esteemed for gay garments but by fools and women.

Walter Raleigh
Divine is Love and scorneth worldly pelf,
And can be bought with nothing but with self.

Walter Raleigh
O eloquent, just, and mighty Death! whom none could advise, thou hast persuaded; what none hath dared, thou hast done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou only hast cast out of the world and despised. Thou hast drawn together all the far-stretched greatness, all the pride, cruelty, and ambition of man, and covered it all over with these two narrow words,

Walter Raleigh
Tell zeal it wants devotion;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it metes but motion;
Tell flesh it is but dust.

Walter Raleigh
Remember... that if thou marry for beauty, thou bindest thyself all thy life for that which perchance will never last nor please thee one year; and when thou hast it, it will be to thee of no price at all, for the desire dieth when it is attained, and the affection perisheth when it is satisfied.

Walter Raleigh
Say to the court, it glows
And shines like rotten wood;
Say to the church, it shows
What's good, and doth no good:
If church and court reply,
Then give them both the lie.

Walter Raleigh
Methought I saw the grave where Laura lay.

Walter Raleigh
Fain would I, but I dare not; I dare, and yet I may not;
I may, although I care not, for pleasure when I play not.

Walter Raleigh
The flowers do fade, and wanton fields To wayward winter reckoning yields; A honey tongue, a heart of gall, Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall.

Walter Raleigh
Whoso desireth to govern well and securely, it behoveth him to have a vigilant eye to the proceedings of great princes, and to consider seriously of their designs.

Walter Raleigh
If all the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee, and be thy love.

Walter Raleigh
In a word, we may gather out of History a policy no less wise than I eternal; by the comparison and application of other mens fore-passed miseries with our own like errours and ill-deservings.

Walter Raleigh
Be advised what thou dost discourse of, and what thou maintainest whether touching religion, state, or vanity; for if thou err in the first, thou shalt be accounted profane; if in the second, dangerous; if in the third, indiscreet and foolish.

Walter Raleigh
War begets quiet, quiet idleness, idleness disorder, disorder ruin; likewise ruin order, order virtue, virtue glory and good fortune.

Walter Raleigh
I can't write a book commensurate with Shakespeare, but I can write a book by me.

Walter Raleigh
Silence in love betrays more woe - Than words though ne'er so witty; A beggar that is dumb, you know, may challenge double pity.

Walter Raleigh
Three things there be that prosper all apace,
And flourish while they are asunder far;
But on a day, they meet all in a place,
And when they meet, they one another mar.
And they be these: the Wood, the Weed, the Wag:
The Wood is that that makes the gallows tree;
The Weed is that that strings the hangman's bag;
The Wag, my pretty knave, betokens thee.

Walter Raleigh
There is nothing exempt from the peril of mutation; the earth, heavens, and whole world is thereunto subject.

Walter Raleigh