Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Heart
A man’s first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart.
Addison—Sir Roger on the Bench.
I have a heart with room for every joy.
Bailey—Festus. Sc. A Mountain.
My favoured temple is an humble heart.
Bailey—Festus. Sc. Colonnade and Lawn.
My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here;
My heart’s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer.
Burns—My Heart’s in the Highlands. (From an old song, The Strong Walls of Derry.)
His heart was one of those which most enamour us,
Wax to receive, and marble to retain.
Byron—Beppo. St. 34.
Maid of Athens, ere we part,
Give, oh, give me back my heart!
Byron—Maid of Athens. St. 1.
Alma de esparto y corazon de encina.
Soul of fibre and heart of oak.
Cervantes—Don Quixote. II. 70.
My heart is wax to be moulded as she pleases, but enduring as marble to retain.
Cervantes—The Little Gypsy.
No command of art,
No toil, can help you hear;
Earth’s minstrelsy falls clear
But on the listening heart.
John Vance Cheney—The Listening Heart.
Some hearts are hidden, some have not a heart.
Crabbe—The Borough. Letter XVII.
“There are strings,” said Mr. Tappertit, “…in the human heart that had better not be wibrated.”
Dickens—Barnaby Rudge. Ch. XXII.
The heart asks pleasure first,
And then, excuse from pain;
And then, those little anodynes
That deaden suffering;
And then, to go to sleep;
And then, if it should be
The will of its Inquisitor,
The liberty to die.
Emily Dickinson—Poems. IX. (Ed. 1891).
Meine Ruh ist hin,
Mein Herz ist schwer.
My peace is gone, my heart is heavy.
Goethe—Faust. I. 15.
Ganz unbefleckt geniesst sich nur das Herz.
Only the heart without a stain knows perfect ease.
Goethe—Iphigenia auf Tauris. IV. 4. 123.
Doch ein gekränktes Herz erholt sich schwer.
A wounded heart can with difficulty be cured.
Goethe—Torquato Tasso. IV. 4. 24.
There is an evening twilight of the heart,
When its wild passion-waves are lulled to rest.
Fitz-Greene Halleck—Twilight.
I caused the widow’s heart to sing for joy.
Job. XXIX. 13.
Let not your heart be troubled.
John. XIV. 1.
The head is always the dupe of the heart.
La Rochefoucauld—Maxims. No. 105.
Wo das Herz reden darf braucht es keiner Vorbereitung.
When the heart dares to speak, it needs no preparation.
Lesseng—Mina von Barnhelm. V. 4.
For his heart was in his work, and the heart
Giveth grace unto every Art.
Longfellow—The Building of the Ship. L. 7.
Something the heart must have to cherish,
Must love, and joy, and sorrow learn;
Something with passion clasp, or perish,
And in itself to ashes burn.
Longfellow—Hyperion. Bk. II. Introduction.
Better to have the poet’s heart than brain,
Feeling than song.
George MacDonald—Within and Without. Pt. III. Sc. 9. L. 30.
The heart is like an instrument whose strings
Steal nobler music from Life’s many frets:
The golden threads are spun thro’ Suffering’s fire,
Wherewith the marriage-robes for heaven are woven:
And all the rarest hues of human life
Take radiance, and are rainbow’d out in tears.
Gerald Massey—Wedded Love.
Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
Matthew. VI. 21.
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
Richard Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton)—The Brookside.
And when once the young heart of a maiden is stolen,
The maiden herself will steal after it soon.
Moore—Ill Omens.
Zwei Kammern hat das Herz.
Drin wohnen,
Die Freude und der Schmerz.
Two chambers hath the heart.
There dwelling,
Live Joy and Pain apart.
Hermann Neumann—Das Herz. Trans. by T. W. H. Robinson. Found in Echoes from Kottabos. Another trans. by Ernest Radford—Chambers Twain.
Yonkers that have hearts of oak at fourscore yeares.
Old Meg of Herefordshire. (1609).
Oh, the heart is a free and a fetterless thing,—
A wave of the ocean, a bird on the wing.
Julia Pardoe—The Captive Greek Girl.
The incense of the heart may rise.
Pierpont—Every Place a Temple.
The heart knoweth his own bitterness.
Proverbs. XIV. 10.
A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance.
Proverbs. XV. 13.
He that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast.
Proverbs. XV. 15.
A man’s heart deviseth his way; but the Lord directeth his steps.
Proverbs. XVI. 9.
He fashioneth their hearts alike.
Psalms. XXXIII. 15.
The heart is a small thing, but desireth great matters. It is not sufficient for a kite’s dinner, yet the whole world is not sufficient for it.
Quarles—Emblems. Bk. I. Hugo de Anima.
This house is to be let for life or years,
Her rent is sorrow, and her income tears;
Cupid, ’t has long stood void; her bills make known,
She must be dearly let, or let alone.
Quarles—Emblems. Bk. II. Epigram X.
My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a water’d shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these,
Because my love is come to me.
Christina G. Rossetti—A Birthday.
Malebranche dirait qu’il n’y a plus une âme:
Nous pensons humblement qu’il reste encor des cœurs.
Malebranche would have it that not a soul is left; we humbly think that there still are hearts.
Edmond Rostand—Chantecler. Prélude.
C’est toujours un mauvais moyen de lire dans le cœur des autres que d’affecter de cacher le sien.
It is always a poor way of reading the hearts of others to try to conceal our own.
Rousseau—Confessions. II.
Nicht Fleisch und Blut; das Herz macht uns zu Vätern und Söhnen.
It is not flesh and blood but the heart which makes us fathers and sons.
Schiller—Die Räuber. I. 1.
Even at this sight
My heart is turn’d to stone: and while ’tis mine,
It shall be stony.
Henry VI. Pt. II. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 49.
The very firstlings of my heart shall be
The firstlings of my hand.
Macbeth. Act IV. Sc. 1. L. 147.
He hath a heart as sound as a bell and his tongue is the clapper, for what his heart thinks his tongue speaks.
Much Ado About Nothing. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 12.
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at; I am not what I am.
Othello. Act I. Sc. 1. L. 64.
Worse than a bloody hand is a hard heart.
Shelley—The Cenci. Act V. Sc. 2.
My heart, the bird of the wilderness, has found its sky in your eyes.
Rabindranath Tagore—Gardener. 31.
Never morning wore
To evening, but some heart did break.
Tennyson—In Memoriam. Pt. VI. Same idea in Lucretius. II. 579.
L’oreille est le chemin du cœur.
The ear is the avenue to the heart.
Voltaire—Réponse au Roi de Prusse.
La bouche obéit mal lorsque le cœur murmure.
The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs.
Voltaire—Tancrède. I. 4.
Who, for the poor renown of being smart,
Would leave a sting within a brother’s heart?
Young—Love of Fame. Satire II. L. 113.
Heaven’s Sovereign saves all beings but himself,
That hideous sight, a naked human heart.
Young—Night Thoughts. Night III. L. 226.