Quotes about tears

A collection of quotes on the topic of tear, doing, likeness, love.

Best quotes about tears

“Beware when making a woman cry. God is counting her tears.”

Paulo Coelho book Adultery

Source: Adultery

“It all ends in tears anyway.”

Jack Kerouac book The Dharma Bums

Source: The Dharma Bums

“I shed more tears than God could ever have required.”

Arthur Rimbaud book Illuminations

Source: Illuminations

“A woman withers when she is watered only with tears.”

Andrzej Majewski (1966) Polish writer and photographer

Aphorisms. Magnum in Parvo (2000)

“You left me drowning in my tears”

Jon Bon Jovi (1962) American singer and musician

Music, New Jersey (1988)

“She's a tear that hangs inside my soul forever”

Jeff Buckley (1966–1997) American singer, guitarist and songwriter

“No tears are shed, when an enemy dies.”

Publilio Siro Latin writer

Maxim 376
Sentences, The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, a Roman Slave

“Smiling through tears.”

Homér Iliad

VI. 484 (tr. Lord Derby); of Andromache.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

“Blood sweat and tears homie I'm made of it”

Kid Cudi (1984) American rapper, singer, songwriter, guitarist and actor from Ohio

-Dat New New
Music

“Tears are silent sorrow, screaming for comfort.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

2005

Gabriel García Márquez quote: “Nobody deserves your tears, but whoever deserves them will not make you cry.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón quote: “Poetry is written with tears, fiction with blood, and history with invisible ink.”

Quotes about tears

“Stars," she whispered. "I can see the stars again, my lady."
A tear trickled down Artemis's cheek. "Yes, my brave one. They are beautiful tonight."
Stars," Zoe repeated. Her eyes fixed on the night sky. And she did not move again.”

Rick Riordan book The Titan's Curse

Source: The Titan's Curse

Beauty, Star, Night

“Count your age by friends, not years. Count your life by smiles, not tears.”

John Lennon (1940–1980) English singer and songwriter

Happy, Birthday, Wise, Life

“Let it go, you've got to forget about revenge. Believe me, in this work I've met a lot of guys who feel the way you do. Trust me, for those who follow the path of revenge, it never ends well. You'll only tear yourself apart and even if you succeed with your revenge, what would you have then... nothing, emptiness.”

Hatake Kakashi book Naruto

To Sasuke

Forgetting, Feeling, Revenge, Way

“Our love affair ended in tears but a deep bond grew out of it, and that's something nobody can take away from us. It's unreachable”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

On his relationship with Mary Austin, as quoted in "Rock On Freddie" (1985).
Context: Our love affair ended in tears but a deep bond grew out of it, and that's something nobody can take away from us. It's unreachable … All my lovers ask me why they can't replace her, but it's simply impossible.
I don't feel jealous of her lovers because. of course, she has a life to lead, and so do I. Basically, I try to make sure she's happy with whoever she's with and she tries to do the same for me.
We look after each other and that's a wonderful form of love. I might have all the problems in the world, but I have Mary and that gets me through.

Love

“Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder.
I sob, I sob.”

Virginia Woolf book The Waves

Source: The Waves

Pain

“Just as I was starting on my journey the idea came to me for a new symphony, this time with a program, but a program which will remain an enigma to all— let them guess it who can. It will be called "A Programmatic Symphony" (No. 6). During my trip, while composing in my mind, I frequently shed tears. When I got home I settled down to sketch it, and the work went so furiously that I had the first movement completely ready in less than four days and the remaining movements are already clearly outlined in my head. Half the third movement is already done. There will be much innovation of form in this symphony— and incidentally, the finale will not be a noisy allegro but, on the contrary, a long drawn-out adagio. You can't imagine what bliss I feel, being convinced that my time is not yet passed and I can still work. Perhaps, of course, I'm mistaken, but I don't think so.”

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840–1893) Russian composer

Letter to a nephew (late February 1893)

Feeling, Home, Imagination, Idea

“God has seen your tears and heard your prayers. Fear not, the child will not die.”

Grigori Rasputin (1869–1916) Russian mystic

As quoted in the opening of The Chalice of Immortality - Page xi - Google Books Result https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1402215037

God, Fear

“Our love affair ended in tears but a deep bond grew out of it, and that's something nobody can take away from us. It's unreachable … All my lovers ask me why they can't replace her, but it's simply impossible.
I don't feel jealous of her lovers because. of course, she has a life to lead, and so do I. Basically, I try to make sure she's happy with whoever she's with and she tries to do the same for me.
We look after each other and that's a wonderful form of love. I might have all the problems in the world, but I have Mary and that gets me through.”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

On his relationship with Mary Austin, as quoted in "Rock On Freddie" (1985).

Happiness, Problem, Lovers, World

“If it were not for the depressing heat and the urgency of the work, one could sit down and laugh to tears at the absurdity of the thing, and under the circumstances it is a little wearing. But our motto is the old west coast proverb,; in other words, don't flurry; patience gains the day.”

Robert Baden-Powell (1857–1941) lieutenant-general in the British Army, writer, founder and Chief Scout of the Scout Movement

Patience

“Music should strike fire from the heart of man, and bring tears from the eyes of woman.”

Ludwig Van Beethoven (1770–1827) German Romantic composer

Music, Heart

“Close friends are truly life's treasures. Sometimes they know us better than we know ourselves. With gentle honesty, they are there to guide and support us, to share our laughter and our tears. Their presence reminds us that we are never really alone.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Friendship, For Friend, For Bestfriend, Life

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love.”

Washington Irving (1783–1859) writer, historian and diplomat from the United States

Sad, Hurtful, Love

“And I wanna kiss you, make you feel alright
I'm just so tired to share my nights
I wanna cry and I wanna love
But all my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up”

Tom Odell (1990) British singer-songwriter

Another Love
Lyrics, Long Way Down

Love, Feeling, Kiss, Cry

“If you cry because the sun has gone out of your life, your tears will prevent you from seeing the stars.”

Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali polymath

Life, Star, Sun, Cry

“they say that time heals all things,
they say you can always forget;
but the smiles and the tears across the years
they twist my heart strings yet!”

George Orwell book 1984

Source: 1984

Smile, Time, Heart, Forgetting

“Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861) English poet, author

Aurora Leigh http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/barrett/aurora/aurora.html (1857) Context: And truly, I reiterate,.. nothing's small! No lily-muffled hum of a summer-bee, But finds some coupling with the spinning stars; No pebble at your foot, but proves a sphere; No chaffinch, but implies the cherubim: And, — glancing on my own thin, veined wrist, — In such a little tremour of the blood The whole strong clamour of a vehement soul Doth utter itself distinct. Earth's crammed with heaven, And every common bush afire with God: But only he who sees, takes off his shoes, The rest sit round it, and pluck blackberries, And daub their natural faces unaware More and more, from the first similitude. Bk. VII, l. 812-826.

God, Shoe

“There is a sacredness in tears…. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love.”

Washington Irving (1783–1859) writer, historian and diplomat from the United States

Sad, Hurtful, Love

“If the Olive Trees knew the hands that planted them, Their Oil would become Tears.”

Mahmoud Darwich (1941–2008) Palestinian writer

Tree

“I am convinced that comics should not only make people laugh. For this in my stories found tears, anger, hatred, pain and end not always happy.”

Osamu Tezuka (1928–1989) Japanese cartoonist and animator

Quoted in Helen McCarthy, Osamu Tezuka: God of manga , translated by Fabio Deotto, Edizioni BD, 2010, back cover.

Pain, People, Anger, Happiness

“I was moved to tears by the thought that from being nobody the night before, I had become somebody.”

Milkha Singh (1935) Indian track and field athlete

While at the EME Army center in 1951 in the cross country race he was declared 6 in the top 10 who among the 500 who ran. Quoted in ‘Flying Sikh' takes a nostalgic jog down memory lane, 6 April 2012, 13 December 2013, The Hindu http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-sports/flying-sikh-takes-a-nostalgic-jog-down-memory-lane/article3285904.ece,

Night

“The tears were flowing again, but he smiled. "That's how it is every day", he said, "all over the world."”

Stephen King book The Green Mile

The Green Mile (1996)
Context: "He kill them with they love", John said. "They love for each other. You see how it was?" I nodded, incapable of speech.
He smiled. The tears were flowing again, but he smiled. "That's how it is every day", he said, "all over the world."

World, Smile

“When I'm thinking about how beautiful you are……I stroke your face with my hand

When you cry….. I wipe away your tears

When you feel happy….. I feel happy also.

When you feel blue….. I am your cheerleader

There are so many things and occassions that I will be there for you.

This is how I know I want to Marry You!”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Happiness, Cry, Beauty, Feeling

“Nobody deserves your tears, but whoever deserves them will not make you cry.”

Gabriel García Márquez (1927–2014) Colombian writer

Cry

“No more memories, no more silent tears. No more gazing across the wasted years. Help me say goodbye.”

Andrew Lloyd Webber (1948) British composer

Memory, Help

“She heard him mutter, 'Can you take away this grief?'
'I'm sorry,' she replied. 'Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears take away grief; that is what they are for.”

Terry Pratchett book I Shall Wear Midnight

Source: I Shall Wear Midnight

Time

“No man is worth your tears, but once you find one that is, he won't make you cry.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) American general and politician, 34th president of the United States (in office from 1953 to 1961)

Cry

“But there was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.”

Viktor E. Frankl book Man's Search for Meaning

Source: Man's Search for Meaning

Courage, Suffering

“Is this the part where you start tearing off strips of your shirt to bind my wounds?"
"If you wanted me to rip my clothes off, you should have just asked.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Bones

Source: City of Bones

Parting, Clothes

“General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Speech at the Brandenburg Gate. (12 June 1987)
1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989)

“Smiles and tears are so alike with me, they are neither of them confined to any particular feelings: I often cry when I am happy, and smile when I am sad.”

Anne Brontë book The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

Source: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848), Ch. XV : An Encounter and its Consequences; Gilbert Markham

Sadness, Smile, Feeling, Cry

“I believe tears are holy, because they show us that the ice of our heart is melting.”

Barbara De Angelis (1951) American psychologist

Heart

“Let your tears roll tonight, but tomorrow you will start the battle again. What defeats us, always, is just our own sorrow.”

Amin Maalouf (1949) Francophone Lebanese writer based in France

Source: The First Century After Beatrice

“Why, I can smile and murder whiles I smile,
And cry 'content' to that which grieves my heart,
And wet my cheeks with artificial tears,
And frame my face for all occasions”

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) English playwright and poet

Source: King Henry VI, Part 3

Smile, Heart, Cry

“If I had to tell you how humans made their way to Earth, it would go like this: In the beginning, there was nothing at all but the moon and the sun. And the moon wanted to come out during the day, but there was something so much brighter that seemed to fill up all those hours. The moon grew hungry, thinner and thinner, until she was just a slice of herself, and her tips were as sharp as a knife. By accident, because that is the way most things happen, she poked a hole in the night and out spilled a million stars, like a fountain of tears.

Horrified, the moon tried to swallow them up. And sometimes this worked, because she got fatter and rounder.. But mostly it didn't, because there were just so many. The stars kept coming, until they made the sky so bright that the sun got jealous. He invited the stars to his side of the world, where it was always bright. What he didn't tell them, though, was that in the daytime, they'd never be seen. So the stupid ones leaped from the sky to the ground, and they froze under the weight of their own foolishness.

The moon did her best. She carved each of these blocks of sorrow into a man or a woman. She spent the rest of her time watching out so that her other stars wouldn't fall. She spent the rest of her time holding onto whatever scraps she had left.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Stupidity, World, Way, Star

“Someday, everything will make perfect sense. So for now, laugh at the confusion, smile through the tears, be strong and keep reminding your self that everything happens for a reason.”

John Mayer (1977) guitarist and singer/songwriter

Smile, Sense, Strong, Perfection

“Hear first the four roots of all things: shining Zeus, life-bringing Hera, Aidoneus, and Nestis, who wets with tears the mortal wellspring.”

Empedocles book On Nature

fr. 6
On Nature
Source: Aidoneus corresponds to Hades.
Source: Nestis corresponds to Persephone.

Life

“If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.”

Rabindranath Tagore Stray Birds

6
Stray Birds (1916)

Star, Sun

“As we walked into the room
There were faces staring, glaring, tearing through me,
Someone said, 'Welcome to your doom,'
Then they smiled with eyes that looked as if they knew me,
This is scaring me.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

This Place Hotel
Triumph (1980)

Smile

“I do not need your red sculpted lips,
Nor hair in loops like a serpent’s coils,
Nor a nape as graceful as a swan’s,
Nor narcissus eyes full of drunkenness,
Nor teeth as perfect as pearls of heaven,
Nor cheeks ruddy and full as pomegranates,
Nor a voice mellifluous as a sarinda,
Nor a figure as elegant as a poplar,
But show me just this one thing, my love,
I seek a heart stained like a poppy flower – Pearls by millions I would gladly cede,
For the sake of tears borne of love and grief.”

Ghani Khan (1914–1996) Pakistani poet

na may sta da nari shundi dy pakar
na da zulfi wal pa wal laka khamar
na da bati pashan danga ghari ghwaram
nargasay stargy na daki da khumar
na ghakhuna dy laluna da adan
na nangy dak sara sara laka anar
na pasti da sarindy pa shan khabari
na wajood laka da saar way mazadar
khu bas yow shai rata ra ukhaya dilbara
da lala pashan zargy ghawaram daghdar
yow dawa ukhaqi chi da ghum ao muhabat way
lakuno laluna dy karam zaar
Entreaty (1929)

Love, Flowers, Heart, Perfection

“The chain of young life is broken,
The journey is ended, the hour has struck, it is time to leave,
Time to go where there is no future,
No past, no eternity, no years;
Where there are no expectations, no passions,
No bitter tears, no fame, no honour;
Where memory sleeps deeply
And the heart in its narrow coffin home
Does not feel the worm gnawing it.”

Mikhail Lermontov (1814–1841) Russian writer, poet and painter

"Death" (1830 or 1831)
Poems

Life, Feeling, Home, Sleep

“Another Boring Love Story

She was risky at best.
She had a sordid past.
She was complicated.
She was wild.
She had numerous demons.
But she had a loving heart.
But she had a soft smile.
But her tears smelled like morning dew.
But she was intelligent and worldly.
But she intimidated men.
So, I dove in headfirst without a second thought.
And wow; she was a demon.
The End”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

2005

Smile, Past, Intelligence, Heart

“While it's true that, recently, Ramiro Gutiérrez had shown a tendency toward tearful and painful literature, he had never felt the same way, for example, as the pathetic Werther or the gallant Don Quixote.”

José Baroja book Un hijo de perra y otros cuentos

Pain, Literature, Way

“We cannot tear a single page from our life, but we can throw the whole book into the fire.”

George Sand book Mauprat

Nous ne pouvons arracher une seule page de notre vie, mais nous pouvons jeter le livre au feu.
Source: Mauprat, ch. 11 (1837); Matilda M. Hays (trans.) Mauprat (London: E. Churton, 1847) p. 121

Life, Books

“Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.”

George Orwell book 1984

Source: 1984

“I know of a cure for everything: salt water… in one way or the other. Sweat, or tears, or the salt sea.”

Karen Blixen (1885–1962) Danish writer

As quoted in Reader's Digest (April 1964)
Variant: I know a cure for everything. Salt water … in one form or another, sweat, tears or the salt sea.
Variant: The cure for anything is salt water — sweat, tears, or the sea.

Way, Water, Sea

“Go ahead and cry, Andy. Don't be afraid of those tears. Sometimes they help to wash the soul clean.”

Sharon M. Draper book Tears of a Tiger

Source: Tears of a Tiger

Soul, Help, Cry

“Nobody is worth your tears, and the one who is won't make you cry”

Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist

Source: The Alchemist

Cry

“Poetry is written with tears, fiction with blood, and history with invisible ink.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón book The Angel's Game

Source: The Angel's Game

History

“As a matter of fact," the other voice went on, "if you do tie her up from time to time, or whip her just a little, and she begins to like it, that’s no good either. You have to get past the pleasure stage, until you reach the stage of tears.”

Pauline Réage book Story of O

Source: Story of O

Pleasure, Time, Past

“Maybe death is the great equalizer, the one big thing that can finally make strangers shed a tear for one another”

Morrie Schwartz (1916–1995) American sociologist

Death

“For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. I sob, I sob.”

Virginia Woolf book The Waves

Source: The Waves

Pain

“All the cunning of the devil is exercised in trying to tear us away from the word.”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

Exercises

“Remember me with smiles and laughter, for that is how I will remember you all. If you can only remember me with tears, then don't remember me at all.”

Laura Ingalls Wilder (1867–1957) American children's writer, diarist, and journalist

Michael Landon, in Little House on the Prairie (TV series), Season 2, Ep 8 (5 November 1975) "Remember Me", Part 1
Misattributed

Smile, Laughter

“Sadness isn't sadness. It's happiness in a black jacket. Tears are not tears. They're balls of laughter dipped in salt. Death is not death. It's life that's jumped off a tall cliff.”

Paul McCartney (1942) English singer-songwriter and composer

Source: Blackbird Singing: Poems and Lyrics, 1965-1999

Life, Death, Sadness, Laughter

“I tore off my mask so as not to lose one of her tears… and she did not run away!… and she did not die!… She remained alive, weeping over me, weeping with me. We cried together! I have tasted all the happiness the world can offer.”

Gaston Leroux book The Phantom of the Opera

Source: The Phantom of the Opera

World, Happiness

“I have loved in life and I have been loved.
I have drunk the bowl of poison from the hands of love as nectar,
and have been raised above life's joy and sorrow.
My heart, aflame in love, set afire every heart that came in touch with it.
My heart has been rent and joined again;
My heart has been broken and again made whole;
My heart has been wounded and healed again;
A thousand deaths my heart has died, and thanks be to love, it lives yet.
I went through hell and saw there love's raging fire,
and I entered heaven illumined with the light of love.
I wept in love and made all weep with me;
I mourned in love and pierced the hearts of men;
And when my fiery glance fell on the rocks, the rocks burst forth as volcanoes.
The whole world sank in the flood caused by my one tear;
With my deep sigh the earth trembled, and when I cried aloud the name of my beloved,
I shook the throne of God in heaven.
I bowed my head low in humility, and on my knees I begged of love,
"Disclose to me, I pray thee, O love, thy secret."
She took me gently by my arms and lifted me above the earth, and spoke softly in my ear,
"My dear one, thou thyself art love, art lover,
and thyself art the beloved whom thou hast adored.”

Hazrat Inayat Khan (1882–1927) Indian Sufi

Source: The Dance of the Soul

Love, Life, Death, Men

“Sometimes when I'm alone
I Cry,
Cause I am on my own.
The tears I cry are bitter and warm.
They flow with life but take no form
I Cry because my heart is torn.
I find it difficult to carry on.
If I had an ear to confide in,
I would cry among my treasured friend,
but who do you know that stops that long,
to help another carry on.
The world moves fast and it would rather pass by.
Then to stop and see what makes one cry,
so painful and sad.
And sometimes…
I Cry
and no one cares about why.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Life, Pain, World, Sadness

“Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.”

George Orwell book 1984

Source: 1984

Love, Victory

“How strange! This bed on which I shall lie has been slept on by more than one dying man, but today it does not repel me! Who knows what corpses have lain on it and for how long? But is a corpse any worse than I? A corpse too knows nothing of its father, mother or sisters or Titus. Nor has a corpse a sweetheart. A corpse, too, is pale, like me. A corpse is cold, just as I am cold and indifferent to everything. A corpse has ceased to live, and I too have had enough of life…. Why do we live on through this wretched life which only devours us and serves to turn us into corpses? The clocks in the Stuttgart belfries strike the midnight hour. Oh how many people have become corpses at this moment! Mothers have been torn from their children, children from their mothers - how many plans have come to nothing, how much sorrow has sprung from these depths, and how much relief!… Virtue and vice have come in the end to the same thing! It seems that to die is man's finest action - and what might be his worst? To be born, since that is the exact opposite of his best deed. It is therefore right of me to be angry that I was ever born into this world! Why was I not prevented from remaining in a world where I am utterly useless? What good can my existence bring to anyone? … But wait, wait! What's this? Tears? How long it is since they flowed! How is this, seeing that an arid melancholy has held me for so long in its grip? How good it feels - and sorrowful. Sad but kindly tears! What a strange emotion! Sad but blessed. It is not good for one to be sad, and yet how pleasant it is - a strange state…”

Frédéric Chopin (1810–1849) Polish composer

Stuttgart. After 8th September 1831.
Source: "Selected Correspondence Of Fryderyk Chopin"; http://archive.org/stream/selectedcorrespo002644mbp/selectedcorrespo002644mbp_djvu.txt

Life, Children, People, Lie

“I didn't know why I was going to cry, but I knew that if anybody spoke to me or looked at me too closely the tears would fly out of my eyes and the sobs would fly out of the throat and I'd cry for a week.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

Cry, Flying

“You do not have to struggle to reach God, but you do have to struggle to tear away the self-created veil that hides him from you”

Paramahansa Yogananda book Autobiography of a Yogi

Source: Autobiography of a Yogi

God

“You made me cry,
when you said goodbye
Ain't that a shame
My tears fell like rain
Ain't that a shame
You're the one to blame”

Fats Domino (1928–2017) American R&B musician

Ain't That a Shame (1955) co-written with Dave Bartholomew

Cry

“I have to find my peace 'cause no-one seems to let me be,
False prophets cry of doom, what are the possibilities?
I told my brothers 'There'll be problem times and tears for fears,
We must live each day like it's the last,
Go with it, go with it, jam!”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

Dangerous (1991)

Fear, Peace, Problem, Time

“Not only were we practicing, we were nervous rehearsing, because he would sit in a chair with a belt in his hand, and if you didn't do it the right way, he would tear you up. Really get you…We were terrified of him. So terrified, I can't tell you. I don't think he realized how scared…scared…I mean SCARED. So scared that I would regurgitate. (with emphasis) Mmm-hmm. (reporter asks Michael what caused the reaction) His presence, just seeing him…And I was so fast, he wouldn't catch me half the time, but when he did, oh my God, it was bad.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

On his father & the whippings he & his brothers would receive from him
Living with Michael Jackson (2002)

God, Way, Thinking, Time

“Listen to the stage manager and get on stage when they tell you to. No one has time for the rock star act. None of the techs backstage care if you're David Bowie or the milkman. When you act like a jerk, they are completely unimpressed with the infantile display that you might think comes with your dubious status. They were there hours before you building the stage, and they will be there hours after you leave tearing it down. They should get your salary, and you should get theirs.”

Henry Rollins book Black Coffee Blues

Black Coffee Blues

Jerk, Star, Thinking, Time

“God has seen your tears and heard your prayers. Do not grieve. The Little One will not die. Do not allow the doctors to bother him too much.”

Grigori Rasputin (1869–1916) Russian mystic

As quoted in Rasputin: The Untold Story By Joseph T. Fuhrmann p.100

God

“Aren’t these liberals, those reprobate defenders of individualism, ashamed to see the tears of the mothers and wives, or don’t these cold-blooded accountants even notice? Have they already grown so inhuman that they are no longer capable of feeling? It is understandable why bolshevism simply removed such creatures. They were worthless to humanity, nothing but an encumbrance to their Volk. Even the bees get rid of the drones when they can no longer be of service to the hive. The Bolshevik procedures are thus quite natural.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

Source: Disputed, Hitler: Memoirs of a Confidant (1978), pp.16-17

Feeling, Understanding, Nature, Bee

“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.”

Walter Scott (1771–1832) Scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet

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

Love, Fear, Hope

“Every action of man, the highest as well as the lowest, is egoistic; for it flows from a certain individuality, a certain I, with a sufficient motive, and can in no way be omitted. To go into the reason of the difference of characters is not the place here; we have simply to accept it as a fact. Now it is just as impossible for the merciful man to let his neighbor starve as it is for the hard-hearted man to help the poor. Each of the two acts according to his character, his nature, his ego, his happiness, consequently egoistically; for if the merciful one did not dry the tears of others, would he be happy? And if the hard-hearted one relieved the suffering of others, would he be satisfied?”

Philipp Mainländer (1841–1876) German poet and philosopher

Source: Philosophie der Erlösung, Erster Band (2014), Ethik, § 11 ISBN 978-1494963262

Motivation, Nature, Happiness, Suffering

“There are certain songs that can really cause you to re-experience an overwhelming melancholy which leads to tears when you hear them. But it's actually not the song that makes you cry, it is the people behind the memories.”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

People, Cry, Memory

“And now, my poor old woman, why are you crying so bitterly? It is autumn. The leaves are falling from the trees like burning tears- the wind howls. Why must you mimic them?”

Mervyn Peake book Titus Groan

Source: Titus Groan

Autumn, Tree, Cry

“So here is my story, may it bring
Some smiles and a tear or so,
It happened once upon a time,
Far away, and long ago,
Outside the night wind keens and wails,
Come listen to me, the Teller of Tales!”

Brian Jacques book Lord Brocktree

Source: Lord Brocktree

Smile, Time, Night

“As he was about to climb yet another dune, his heart whispered, "Be aware of the place where you are brought to tears. That's where I am, and thats where your treasure is.”

Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist

Source: The Alchemist

Heart

“Ceaseless as the interminable voices of the bell-cricket, all night till dawn my tears flow.”

Murasaki Shikibu book The Tale of Genji

Source: Tale of Genji, The Tale of Genji, trans. Arthur Waley, Ch. 1

Night

“But how,” said Charles, who was close to tears, “how can you possibly justify cold-blooded murder?’
Henry lit a cigarette. “I prefer to think of it,” he had said, “as redistribution of matter.”

Donna Tartt book The Secret History

Source: The Secret History

Thinking

“Either it brings tears to their eyes, or else -"
"Or else what?" said Alice, for the Knight had made a sudden pause.
"Or else it doesn't, you know.”

Lewis Carroll book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Source: Alice in Wonderland

“Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts. There are seven words that will make a person love you. There are ten words that will break a strong man’s will. But a word is nothing but a painting of a fire. A name is the fire itself.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Name of the Wind

Source: The Name of the Wind (2007), Chapter 86, “The Fire Itself” (pp. 672-673)

Love, Men, Light, Strong

“And presently I was driving through the drizzle of the dying day, with the windshield wipers in full action but unable to cope with my tears.”

Vladimir Nabokov book Lolita

Source: Lolita

“How does he love me? With adoration, with fertile tears,
With groans that thunder love, with sighs of fire.”

William Shakespeare Twelfth Night

Source: Twelfth Night

Love

“Choking with dry tears and raging, raging, raging at the absolute indifference of nature and the world to the death of love, the death of hope and the death of beauty, I remember sitting on the end of my bed, collecting these pills and capsules together and wondering why, why when I felt I had so much to offer, so much love, such outpourings of love and energy to spend on the world, I was incapable of being offered love, giving it or summoning the energy with which I knew I could transform myself and everything around me.”

Stephen Fry book Moab Is My Washpot

Source: Moab Is My Washpot

Depressing, Love, Death, World

“Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,
And therefore I forbid my tears.”

William Shakespeare Hamlet

Source: Hamlet

Water

“I know what loves are trembling into fire; how jealousy shoots its green flashes hither and thither; how intricately love crosses love; love makes knots; love brutally tears them apart. I have been knotted; I have been torn apart.”

Virginia Woolf book The Waves

Source: The Waves

Love, Jealousy

“Tears do not burn except in solitude.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

Source: On the Heights of Despair (1934)

Solitude

“She wanted to go over and hug his tears away, but she was too frightened.”

Steven Spielberg (1946) American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur

Source: Close Encounters of the Third Kind

“And alien tears will fill for him
Pity's long-broken urn,
For his mourners will be outcast men,
And outcasts always mourn.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Pt. IV, st. 23 -- Wilde's epitaph
The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898)
Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Writings

Men

“Tears are words that need to be written.”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Heartbreaking, Sad

“Do tears not yet spilled wait in small lakes?”

Pablo Neruda (1904–1973) Chilean poet

Waiting

“Half of the people lie with their lips; the other half with their tears”

Nassim Nicholas Taleb book The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

Source: The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

People, Lie

“No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.”

Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet

The Figure a Poem Makes (1939)

“Tears shed for self are tears of weakness, but tears shed for others are a sign of strength.”

Billy Graham (1918–2018) American Christian evangelist

Moving On

“Ennui is the echo in us of time tearing itself apart.”

Emil M. Cioran book A Short History of Decay

A Short History of Decay (1949)

Time

“When a golden girl can win
Prayer from out the lips of sin,
When the barren almond bears,
And a little child gives away its tears,
Then shall all the house be still
And peace come to Canterville.”

Oscar Wilde book The Canterville Ghost

Source: The Canterville Ghost

Peace, Girl, Housing

“In secret pleasure — secret tears
This changeful life has slipped away”

Emily Brontë book Wuthering Heights

I Am the Only Being (1836)
Source: Wuthering Heights
Context: I am the only being whose doom
No tongue would ask no eye would mourn
I never caused a thought of gloom
A smile of joy since I was born
In secret pleasure — secret tears
This changeful life has slipped away
As friendless after eighteen years
As lone as on my natal day

Life, Pleasure, Secret, Change

“Words are tears that have been written down. Tears are words that need to be shed. Without them, joy loses all its brilliance and sadness has no end.”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Source: Aleph

Sadness, Joy

“"Do you know a cure for me?" "Why yes," he said, "I know a cure for everything. Salt water." "Salt water?" I asked him. "Yes," he said, "in one way or the other. Sweat, or tears, or the salt sea."”

Karen Blixen book Seven Gothic Tales

"The Deluge at Norderney"
Source: Seven Gothic Tales (1934)

Way, Water, Sea

“When we lose one we love, our bitterest tears are called forth by the memory of hours when we loved not enough.”

Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949) Belgian playwright, poet, and essayist

Quand nous perdons un être aimé, ce qui nous fait pleurer les larmes qui ne soulagent point, c'est le souvenir des moments où nous ne l'avons pas assez aimé.
Wisdom and Destiny (1898)

Love, Memory

“Sometimes we love with nothing more than hope. Sometimes we cry with everything except tears. In the end that’s all there is: love and its duty, sorrow and its truth. In the end that’s all we have - to hold on tight until the dawn”

Gregory David Roberts book Shantaram

Source: Shantaram

Love, Truth, Hope, Cry

“I wish I hadn't cried so much!” said Alice, as she swam about, trying to find her way out.
I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears!”

Lewis Carroll book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Source: Alice in Wonderland

Way