George Gordon Byron: Quotes about love

George Gordon Byron was English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement. Explore interesting quotes on love.
George Gordon Byron: 454 quotes9 likes

“Friendship is Love without wings.”

George Gordon Byron

L'Amitié est l'Amour sans Ailes, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

“I was not form'd
To prize a love like thine, a mind like thine,
Nor dote even on thy beauty — as I've doted
On lesser charms, for no cause save that such
Devotion was a duty, and I hated
All that look'd like a chain for me or others”

George Gordon Byron Sardanapalus

Act IV, scene 1.
Sardanapalus (1821)
Context: But take this with thee: if I was not form'd
To prize a love like thine, a mind like thine,
Nor dote even on thy beauty — as I've doted
On lesser charms, for no cause save that such
Devotion was a duty, and I hated
All that look'd like a chain for me or others
(This even rebellion must avouch); yet hear
These words, perhaps among my last — that none
E'er valued more thy virtues, though he knew not
To profit by them…

“The light of love, the purity of grace,
The mind, the music breathing from her face, 19
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole,—
And oh, that eye was in itself a soul!”

George Gordon Byron book The Bride of Abydos

Canto I, Stanza 6; this can be compared to: "The bloom of young Desire and purple light of Love", Thomas Gray, The Progress of Poesy I. 3, line 16; also: "Oh, could you view the melody / Of every grace / And music of her face", Richard Lovelace, Orpheus to Beasts; "There is music in the beauty, and the silent note which Cupid strikes, far sweeter than the sound of an instrument", Thomas Browne, Religio Medici, Part ii, Section ix.
The Bride of Abydos (1813)

“Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle
Are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime?
Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the turtle,
Now melt into sorrow, now madden to crime!”

George Gordon Byron book The Bride of Abydos

Canto I, stanza 1; this can be compared to: "Know'st thou the land where the lemon-trees bloom, / Where the gold orange glows in the deep thicket's gloom, / Where a wind ever soft from the blue heaven blows, / And the groves are of laurel and myrtle and rose!" Goethe, Wilhelm Meister.
The Bride of Abydos (1813)

“The love where Death has set his seal,
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,
Nor falsehood disavow.”

George Gordon Byron

And Thou Art Dead as Young and Fair http://readytogoebooks.com/LB-thou38.html (1812).

“The cold in clime are cold in blood,
Their love can scarce deserve the name.”

George Gordon Byron The Giaour

Source: The Giaour (1813), Line 1099.

“I loved my country, and I hated him.”

George Gordon Byron book The Vision of Judgment

The Vision of Judgment, lxxxiii, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).