Walter Scott Quotes

“Fight on, brave knights! Man dies, but glory lives! Fight on; death is better than defeat! Fight on brave knights! for bright eyes behold your deeds!”

Canto VI, st. 17.
Variant: Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive
Source: Marmion (1808)

“For he that does good, having the unlimited power to do evil, deserves praise not only for the good which he performs, but for the evil which he forbears.”

“The rose is fairest when 't is budding new,
And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears.
The rose is sweetest wash'd with morning dew,
And love is loveliest when embalm'd in tears.”

Source: Ivanhoe (1819), Ch. 33, The Black Knight speaking to Locksley.

“Cats are a mysterious kind of folk.”

Canto IV, stanza 1. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, and men below, and the saints above, for love is heaven, and heaven is love.”

“All men who have turned out worth anything have had the chief hand in their own education.”

Canto III, stanza 2.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)
Context: In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed;
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed;
In halls, in gay attire is seen;
In hamlets, dances on the green.
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And men below, and saints above;
For love is heaven, and heaven is love.

Walter Scott Quotes about men

“I have heard men talk about the blessings of freedom," he said to himself, "but I wish any wise man would teach me what use to make of it now that I have it.”

Letter to J. G. Lockhart (c. 16 June 1830), in H. J. C. Grierson (ed.), Letters of Sir Walter Scott, Vol. II (1936), as reported in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (1999), p. 652

“It's no fish ye're buying, it's men's lives.”

Source: Ivanhoe

Walter Scott book The Antiquary

Volume I, Ch. 11.
The Antiquary (1816)

“One hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum, in which men steal through existence, like sluggish waters through a marsh, without either honour or observation.”

“Thus aged men, full loth and slow,
The vanities of life forego,
And count their youthful follies o'er,
Till Memory lends her light no more.”

Countess Brenhilda in Count Robert of Paris (1832), Ch. 25.

Walter Scott book Rokeby

Canto V, stanza 1.
Rokeby (1813)

“But woe awaits a country when
She sees the tears of bearded men.”

“[Romeo … transfers his affections from Rosalind to Juliet] 'A lover, my dear Lady Betty,' said Flora, 'may, I conceive, persevere in his suit, under very discouraging circumstances. Affection can (now and then) withstand very severe storms of rigour, but not a long polar frost of downright indifference. Don't, even with your attractions, try the experiment upon any lover whose faith you value. Love will subsist on wonderfully little hope, but not altogether without it.”

Canto V, stanza 16.
Marmion (1808)

Walter Scott Quotes about love

Walter Scott book Waverley

Source: Waverley (1814), Chapter LIV

“So shall he strive, in changeful hue,
Field, feast, and combat, to renew,
And loves, and arms, and harpers' glee,
And all the pomp of chivalry.”

“Her blue eyes sought the west afar,
For lovers love the western star.”

Canto V, introduction.
Marmion (1808)

“So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.”

Canto III, stanza 24.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

“Thy hue, dear pledge, is pure and bright
As in that well-remember'd night
When first thy mystic braid was wove,
And first my Agnes whisper'd love.”

Canto V, st. 12 (Lochinvar, st. 1).
Marmion (1808)

“T is an old tale and often told;
But did my fate and wish agree,
Ne'er had been read, in story old,
Of maiden true betray'd for gold,
That loved, or was avenged, like me.”

To a Lock of Hair http://www.bartleby.com/106/105.html.

“Is death the last sleep? No, it is the last and final awakening.”

Canto II, stanza 27.
Marmion (1808)

Walter Scott: Trending quotes

“Revenge is the sweetest morsel to the mouth, that ever was cooked in hell.”

“The will to do, the soul to dare”

The Heart of Midlothian', Ch. 30 (1818).
Source: The Heart of Mid-Lothian

“True love's the gift which God has given
To man alone beneath the heaven”

Canto I, stanza 21. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810) Context: On his bold visage middle age Had slightly pressed its signet sage, Yet had not quenched the open truth And fiery vehemence of youth; Forward and frolic glee was there, The will to do, the soul to dare, The sparkling glance, soon blown to fire, Of hasty love or headlong ire.

Walter Scott Quotes

“Time will rust the sharpest sword,
Time will consume the strongest cord”

Canto V, stanza 13.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)
Context: True love's the gift which God has given
To man alone beneath the heaven:
It is not fantasy's hot fire,
Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly;
It liveth not in fierce desire,
With dead desire it doth not die;
It is the secret sympathy,
The silver link, the silken tie,
Which heart to heart, and mind to mind
In body and in soul can bind.

Walter Scott Harold the Dauntless

Harold the Dauntless (1817), Canto I, st. 4.
Context: Time will rust the sharpest sword,
Time will consume the strongest cord;
That which molders hemp and steel,
Mortal arm and nerve must feel.

“Each age has deemed the new-born year
The fittest time for festal cheer.”

“Many a law, many a commandment have I broken, but my word never.”

“We are like the herb which flourisheth most when trampled upon”

“The misery of keeping a dog is his dying so soon. But, to be sure, if he lived for fifty years and then died, what would become of me?”

Source: Ivanhoe

“I envy thee not thy faith, which is ever in thy mouth but never in thy heart nor in thy practice”

“Silence, maiden; thy tongue outruns thy discretion.”

Source: Ivanhoe

“We shall never learn to feel and respect our real calling and destiny, unless we have taught ourselves to consider every thing as moonshine, compared with the education of the heart.”

Source: Ivanhoe

“Will future ages believe that such stupid bigotry ever existed!”

“A lawyer without history or literature is a mechanic, a mere working mason; if he possesses some knowledge of these, he may venture to call himself an architect.”

“Jock, when ye hae naething else to do, ye may be ay sticking in a tree; it will be growing, Jock, when ye're sleeping.”

Sir Walter Scott Collection Guy Mannering. Chap. xxxvii.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Walter Scott book The Heart of Midlothian

The Heart of Midlothian (1818), Ch. 8.

“There's a gude time coming.”

Walter Scott book Rob Roy

Source: Rob Roy (1817), Chapter 32.

“Art thou a friend to Roderick?”

“He’s expected at noon, and no wight till he comes
May profane the great chair, or the porridge of plums;
For the best of the cheer, and the seat by the fire,
Is the undenied right of the Barefooted Friar.”

Canto IV, stanza 30. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“Now I protest to thee, gentle reader, that I entirely dissent from Francisco de Ubeda in this matter, and hold it the most useful quality of my pen, that it can speedily change from grave to gay, and from description and dialogue to narrative and character. So that, if my quill display no other propertoies of its mothergoose than her mutability, truly I shall be well pleased; and I conceive that you, my worthy friend, will have no occasion for discontent. From the jargon, therefore, of the Highland gillies, I pass to the character of their Chief. It is an important examination, and therefore, like Dogberry, we must spare no wisdom.”

Source: Ivanhoe (1819), Ch. 17, One of the verses of the ballad "The Barefooted Friar", sung by Friar Tuck to the Black Knight.

Walter Scott book Waverley

Source: Waverley (1814), Chapter XIX

“But with the morning cool reflection came.”

Walter Scott book Chronicles of the Canongate

Chronicles of the Canongate, Chap. iv.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“O! many a shaft at random sent
Finds mark the archer little meant!
And many a word, at random spoken,
May soothe or wound a heart that's broken!”

“A foot more light, a step more true,
Ne'er from the heath-flower dash'd the dew.”

Canto V, stanza 18.
The Lord of the Isles (1815)

“Chivalry!-why, maiden, she is the nurse of pure and high affection-the stay of the oppressed, the redresser of grievances, the curb of the power of the tyrant-Nobility were but an empty name without her, and liberty finds the best protection in her lance and her sword.”

Canto I, stanza 18. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“O fading honours of the dead!
O high ambition, lowly laid!”

Source: Ivanhoe (1819), Ch. 29, Ivanhoe explains to Rebecca the virtues of chivalry.

“In man's most dark extremity
Oft succour dawns from Heaven.”

Canto II, stanza 10.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

“Vacant heart, and hand, and eye,
Easy live and quiet die.”

Canto I, stanza 20.
The Lord of the Isles (1815)

Walter Scott book The Bride of Lammermoor

The Bride of Lammermoor (1819), Ch. 3 - Lucy Ashton's Song.

“Bluid is thicker than water.”

Walter Scott book Guy Mannering

Guy Mannering (1815), Ch. 38.

“I cannot tell how the truth may be;
I say the tale as 'twas said to me.”

“No pale gradations quench his ray,
No twilight dews his wrath allay.”

Canto II, stanza 22.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

Walter Scott book Rokeby

Canto VI, stanza 21.
Rokeby (1813)

“Hail to the Chief who in triumph advances!”

“Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er,
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking;
Dream of battled fields no more,
Days of danger, nights of waking.”

Canto II, stanza 19. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“In the lost battle,
Borne down by the flying,
Where mingles war's rattle
With groans of the dying.”

Canto I, stanza 31. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“Randolph, thy wreath has lost a rose.”

Canto III, stanza 11.
Marmion (1808)

“Pride and jealousy there was in his eye, for his life had been spent in asserting rights which were constantly liable to invasion; and the prompt, fiery, and resolute disposition of the man, had been kept constantly upon the alert by the circumstances of his situation.”

Canto VI, stanza 18.
The Lord of the Isles (1815)

“There is yet spirit in him, were it well directed- but, like the Greek fire, it burns whatever approaches it.”

Source: Ivanhoe (1819), Ch. 3.

“Spangling the wave with lights as vain
As pleasures in the vale of pain,
That dazzle as they fade.”

Source: Ivanhoe (1819), Ch. 43, Malvoisin to Mont-Fitchet

“The playbill, which is said to have announced the tragedy of Hamlet, the character of the Prince of Denmark being left out.”

Canto I, stanza 23.
The Lord of the Isles (1815)

Walter Scott book The Talisman

The Talisman (1825), Introduction.

“The way was long, the wind was cold,
The Minstrel was infirm and old;
His withered cheek, and tresses gray,
Seemed to have known a better day.”

“Ah! County Guy, the hour is nigh,
The sun has left the lea.”

Introduction
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

Walter Scott book Quentin Durward

Quentin Durward (1823), Ch. 4.

“She look'd down to blush, and she look'd up to sigh,
With a smile on her lips, and a tear in her eye.”

“There is no European nation which, within the course of half a century, or little more, has undergone so complete a change as this kingdom of Scotland. The effects of the insurrection of the 1745 — the destruction of the patriarchal power of the Highland chiefs — the abolition of the heritable jurisdictions of the Lowland nobility and barons — the total eradication of the Jacobite party […]. […] This race has now almost entirely vanished from the land, and with it, doubtless, much absurd political prejudice — but also many living examples of singular ad disinterested attachment to the principles of loyalty which they received from their fathers, and of old Scottish faith, hospitality, worth, and honour. […] for the purpose of preserving some idea of the ancient manners of which I have witnessed the almost total extinction, I have embodied in imaginary scenes […].”

Canto V, st. 12 (Lochinvar, st. 5).
Marmion (1808)

Walter Scott book Waverley

Source: Waverley (1814), Chapter LXXII, A postscript, which should have been a preface

“I was not always a man of woe.”

“But search the land of living men,
Where wilt thou find their like again?”

Canto II, stanza 12.
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)

“November’s sky is chill and drear,
November’s leaf is red and sear.”

Canto I, introduction, st. 11.
Marmion (1808)

“when we had a king, and a chancellor, and parliament-men o' our ain, we could aye peeble them wi' stanes when they werena gude bairns - But naebody's nails can reach the length o' Lunnon.”

Canto I, introduction, st. 1.
Marmion (1808)

Walter Scott book The Heart of Midlothian

The Heart of Midlothian (1818), Ch. 4.

“Respect was mingled with surprise,
And the stern joy which warriors feel
In foeman worthy of their steel.”

“"Lambe them, lads! lambe them!" a cant phrase of the time derived from the fate of Dr. Lambe, an astrologer and quack, who was knocked on the head by the rabble in Charles the First's time.”

Canto V, stanza 10. The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

Walter Scott book Peveril of the Peak

Peveril of the Peak, Chap. xlii.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“Profan'd the God-given strength, and marr'd the lofty line.”

“War's a fearsome thing. They'll be cunning that catches me at this wark again.”

Canto I, introduction.
Marmion (1808)

Walter Scott book Old Mortality

Old Mortality, Volume II (1816), Chapter XI.

“Rouse the lion from his lair.”

Walter Scott book The Talisman

The Talisman (1825), Heading, Ch. 6.

“Tell that to the marines—the sailors won't believe it.”

Walter Scott book Redgauntlet

Redgauntlet, Vol. II (1824), Ch. 13 http://books.google.com/books?id=ixkGAAAAQAAJ&q=%22Tell+that+to+the+marines+the+sailors+won't+believe+it%22&pg=PA326#v=onepage.

“The stag at eve had drunk his fill,
Where danced the moon on Monan's rill,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney's hazel shade.”