Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Treachery; Treason
Is there not some chosen curse,
Some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven,
Red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man
Who owes his greatness to his country’s ruin?
Addison—Cato. Act I. Sc. 1.
Nemo unquam sapiens proditori credendum putavit.
No wise man ever thought that a traitor should be trusted.
Cicero—Orationes In Verrem. II. 1. 15.
This principle is old, but true as fate,
Kings may love treason, but the traitor hate.
Thomas Dekker—The Honest Whore. Pt. I. Act IV. Sc. 4.
Treason is not own’d when ’tis descried;
Successful crimes alone are justified.
Dryden—Medals. L. 207.
O that a soldier so glorious, ever victorious in fight,
Passed from a daylight of honor into the terrible night;
Fell as the mighty archangel, ere the earth glowed in space, fell—
Fell from the patriot’s heaven down to the loyalist’s hell!
Thos. Dunn English—Arnold at Stillwater.
With evil omens from the harbour sails
The ill-fated ship that worthless Arnold bears;
God of the southern winds, call up thy gales,
And whistle in rude fury round his ears.
Philip Freneau—Arnold’s Departure.
Rebellion must be managed with many swords; treason to his prince’s person may be with one knife.
Fuller—The Holy and Profane States. The Traitor.
Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
Sir John Harrington—Epigrams. Bk. IV. Ep. V.
Judas had given them the slip.
Matthew Henry—Commentaries. Matthew. XXII.
Tarquin and Cæsar had each his Brutus—Charles the First, his Cromwell—and George the Third—(“Treason!” shouted the Speaker) may profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it.
Patrick Henry—Speech. (1765).
The man who pauses on the paths of treason,
Halts on a quicksand, the first step engulfs him.
Aaron Hill—Henry V. Act I. Sc. 1.
For while the treason I detest,
The traitor still I love.
Hoole—Metastatio. Romulus and Hersilia. Act I. Sc. 5.
Ipsa se fraus, etiamsi initio cautior fuerit, detegit.
Treachery, though at first very cautious, in the end betrays itself.
Livy—Annales. XLIV. 15.
The traitor to Humanity is the traitor most accursed;
Man is more than Constitutions; better rot beneath the sod,
Than be true to Church and State while we are doubly false to God.
Lowell—On the Capture of Certain Fugitive Slaves near Washington.
Hast thou betrayed my credulous innocence
With vizor’d falsehood and base forgery?
Milton—Comus. L. 697.
Oh, colder than the wind that freezes
Founts, that but now in sunshine play’d,
Is that congealing pang which seizes
The trusting bosom, when betray’d.
Moore—Lalla Rookh. The Fire Worshippers.
Oh, for a tongue to curse the slave
Whose treason, like a deadly blight,
Comes o’er the councils of the brave,
And blasts them in their hour of might!
Moore—Lalla Rookh. The Fire-Worshippers.
He [Cæsar] loved the treason, but hated the traitor.
Plutarch—Life of Romulus.
The man was noble,
But with his last attempt he wiped it out:
Destroy’d his country, and his name remains
To the ensuing age abhorr’d.
Coriolanus. Act V. Sc. 3. L. 145.
Though those that are betray’d
Do feel the treason sharply, yet the traitor
Stands in worse case of woe.
Cymbeline. Act III. Sc. 4. L. 87.
I did pluck allegiance from men’s hearts,
Loud shouts and salutations from their mouths,
Even in the presence of the crowned king.
Henry IV. Pt. I. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 52.
Treason is but trusted like the fox
Who, ne’er so tame, so cherish’d and locked up,
Will have a wild trick of his ancestors.
Henry IV. Pt. I. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 9.
Some guard these traitors to the block of death;
Treason’s true bed and yielder up of breath.
Henry IV. Pt. II. Act IV. Sc. 2. L. 122.
Treason and murder ever kept together,
As two yoke-devils sworn to either’s purpose,
Working so grossly in a natural cause,
That admiration did not hoop at them.
Henry V. Act II. Sc. 2. L. 105.
Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep;
And in his simple show he harbours treason.
Henry VI. Pt. II. Act III. Sc. 1. L. 53.
To say the truth, so Judas kiss’d his master,
And cried “all hail!” whereas he meant all harm.
Henry VI. Pt. III. Act V. Sc. 7. L. 33.
Et tu Brute! Then fall, Cæsar!
Julius Cæsar. Act III. Sc. 1. L. 77.
Know, my name is lost;
By treason’s tooth bare-gnawn and canker-bit.
King Lear. Act V. Sc. 3. L. 121.
Tellest thou me of “ifs”? Thou art a traitor:
Off with his head!
Richard III. Act III. Sc. 4. L. 77. “Off with his head! so much for Buckingham!” As altered by Colley Cibber.