“All my joys to this are folly
Naught so sweet as melancholy.”
Robert Burton book The Anatomy of Melancholy
The Author's Abstract.
The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621)
“Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most melancholy!”
Source: Il Penseroso (1631), Line 61
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Most musical, most melancholy!" by John Milton?
John Milton190
English epic poet 1608–1674Related quotes
John Fletcher (1579–1625) English Jacobean playwright
The Nice Valor (1647), Melancholy. Compare: "Naught so sweet as melancholy", Robert Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy.
“Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.”
William Shakespeare As You Like It
Source: As You Like It
“They that govern the most make the least noise.”
John Selden (1584–1654) English jurist and scholar of England's ancient laws and constitution, and of Jewish law
Power.
Table Talk (1689)
“My melancholy is the most faithful sweetheart I have had.”
Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism
Variant: My melancholy is the most faithful mistress I have known; what wonder, then, that I love her in return.
Source: Either/Or: A Fragment of Life
“Aristotle said melancholy men of all others are most witty.”
Robert Burton book The Anatomy of Melancholy
Section 3, member 1, subsection 3.
The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), Part I
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) British journalist, businessman, and essayist
Source: Physics and Politics http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/phypl10.txt (1869), Ch. 5 <br class="br">Context: I wish the art of benefiting men had kept pace with the art of destroying them; for though war has become slow, philanthropy has remained hasty. The most melancholy of human reflections, perhaps, is that, on the whole, it is a question whether the, benevolence of mankind does most good or harm. Great good, no doubt, philanthropy does, but then it also does great evil. It augments so much vice, it multiplies so much suffering, it brings to life such great populations to suffer and to be vicious, that it is open to argument whether it be or be not an evil to the world, and this is entirely because excellent people fancy that they can do much by rapid action — that they will most benefit the world when they most relieve their own feelings; that as soon as an evil is seen "something" ought to be done to stay and prevent it.