(1612 - 1680 / England)

poet Samuel Butler

Quotations

  • ''When civil fury first grew high,
    And men fell out, they knew not why;
    When hard words, jealousies, and fears,
    Set folks together by the ears,
    And made them fight, like mad or drunk,
    For Dame Religion, as for punk;''
    Samuel Butler (1612-1680), British poet. Hudibras (l. 1-6). OxBoLi. Everyman's Book of English Verse. John Wain, ed. (1981) J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd.
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  • ''God and the Devil are an effort after specialization and the division of labor.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. First published in 1912. Samuel Butler's Notebooks, p. 295, E.P. Dutton & Company (1951).
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  • ''A skilful leech is better far
    Than half a hundred men of war.''
    Samuel Butler (1612-1680), British poet. eds. John Wilders and Hugh de Quehen (1973). Hudibras, pt. 1, cto. 2, l. 245 (1663).
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  • ''The Athanasian Creed is to me light and intelligible reading in comparison with much that now passes for science.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. First published in 1912. Samuel Butler's Notebooks, p. 125, E.P. Dutton & Company (1951).
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  • ''Love is a boy, by poets styled,
    Then spare the rod and spoil the child.''
    Samuel Butler (1612-1680), British poet. eds. John Wilders and Hugh de Quehen (1973). Hudibras, pt. 2, cto. 1, l. 843 (1664).
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  • ''It is tact that is golden, not silence.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. Samuel Butler's Notebooks, p. 229 (1951).
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  • ''For he could coin, or counterfeit
    New words, with little or no wit;
    Words so debas'd and hard, no stone
    Was hard enough to touch them on;
    And when with hasty noise he spoke 'em;
    The ignorant for current took 'em;''
    Samuel Butler (1612-1680), British poet. Hudibras (l. 109-114). OxBoLi. Everyman's Book of English Verse. John Wain, ed. (1981) J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd.
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  • ''The dead being the majority it is a natural thing that we should have more friends among these than among the living.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. First published in 1912. Samuel Butler's Notebooks, p. 221, E.P. Dutton & Company (1951).
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  • ''It was very good of God to let Carlyle and Mrs. Carlyle marry one another and so make only two people miserable instead of four, besides being very amusing.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. letter, Nov. 21, 1884. Letters Between Samuel Butler and E.M.A. Savage 1871-1885 (1935). The quote has been erroneously ascribed to Tennyson.
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  • ''It is the manner of gods and prophets to begin: "Thou shalt have none other God or Prophet but me." If I were to start as a God or a prophet I think I should take the line: "Thou shalt not believe in me. Thou shalt not have me for a God. Thou shalt worship any d_____d thing thou likest except me." This should be my first and great commandment, and my second should be like unto it.''
    Samuel Butler (1835-1902), British author. First published in 1912. Samuel Butler's Notebooks, p. 88, E.P. Dutton & Company (1951).
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Sonnets On Miss Savage

i
She was too kind, wooed too persistently,
Wrote moving letters to me day by day;
The more she wrote, the more unmoved was I,
The more she gave, the less could I repay.
Therefore I grieve, not that I was not loved,
But that, being loved, I could not love again.
I liked, but like and love are far removed;
Hard though I tried to love I tried in vain.

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