
“This is your heart. Keep it locked until the chap turns up who has the key.”
Source: Just Patty
Canto XIII, lines 58–60 (tr. C. E. Norton).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno
Io son colui che tenni ambo le chiavi | del cor di Federigo, e che le volsi, | serrando e disserrando.
Pier della Vigna: XIII, 58-60
Variant: Io son colui, che tenni ambo le chiavi
Del cor di Federigo, e sì le volsi,
Serrando e disserrando, sì soavi.
“This is your heart. Keep it locked until the chap turns up who has the key.”
Source: Just Patty
House, x.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
Literary Essays, vol. II (1870–1890), New England Two Centuries Ago
Song lyrics, Biograph (1985), Up to Me (recorded 1974)
“A man who is of 'sound mind' is one who keeps his inner madman under lock and key.”
Source: Unsourced
“Of my Base metal may be filed a Key,
That shall unlock the Door he howls without.”
The Rubaiyat (1120)
Context: The Vine had struck a fibre: which about
If clings my being — let the Dervish flout;
Of my Base metal may be filed a Key,
That shall unlock the Door he howls without.