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Miguel de Cervantes Quotes - Page 12

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They must take me for a fool, or even worse, a lunatic. And no wonder ,for I am so intensely conscious of my misfortune and my misery is so overwhelming that I am powerless to resist it and am being turned into stone,

They must take me for a fool, or even worse, a lunatic. And no wonder ,for I am so intensely conscious of my misfortune and my misery is so overwhelming that I am powerless to resist it and am being turned into stone, devoid of all knowledge or feeling.

Miguel de Cervantes
Feelings, Stones, Fool
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1981). “Don Quixote”, Signet Classics

Little said is soon amended.

Miguel de Cervantes
Littles, Said
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Pierre Antoine Motteux (1719). “The history of the renowned don Quixote de la Mancha. Tr. by several hands: and publ. by P. Motteux”, p.257

No fathers or mothers think their own children ugly.

Miguel de Cervantes
Beauty, Mother, Children
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Vicente de los Rios, Quixote de la Mancha (don, fict.name.) (1819). “Don Quixote de la Mancha. Tr. by C. Jarvis”, p.199

In hell there is no retention.

Miguel de Cervantes
Hell, Retention
"El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (The Ingenious Nobleman Sir Quixote of La Mancha)". Book by Miguel de Cervantes (Part I, Chapter 25), 1612.

'Tis the maddest trick a man can ever play in his whole life, to let his breath sneak out of his body without any more ado, and without so much as a rap o'er the pate, or a kick of the guts; to go out like the snuff of a farthing candle, and die merely of the mulligrubs, or the sullens.

Miguel de Cervantes
Death, Prayer, Rap
Miguel De Cervantes (1930). “Don Quixote”

Be temperate in your drinking, remembering that too much wine cannot keep either a secret or a promise.

Miguel de Cervantes
Drinking, Wine, Secret

Many count their chickens before they are hatched; and where they expect bacon, meet with broken bones.

Miguel de Cervantes
Men, Broken, Bones
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1856). “The History of the Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote of La Mancha”, p.196

I do not deny that what happened to us is a thing worth laughing at. But it is not worth telling, for not everyone is sufficiently intelligent to be able to see things from the right point of view.

Miguel de Cervantes
Intelligent, Views, Laughing
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (2006). “Don Quixote”, p.160, Collector's Library

Delay always heeds danger.

Miguel de Cervantes
Delay, Danger, Heed
"Don Quixote". Book by Miguel de Cervantes, Book IV, Chapter III, 1605-1615.

It is one thing to write as poet and another to write as a historian: the poet can recount or sing about things not as they were, but as they should have been, and the historian must write about them not as they should have been, but as they were, without adding or subtracting anything from the truth.

Miguel de Cervantes
Writing, Should Have, Epic Poems

But my thoughts ran a wool-gathering; and I did like the countryman, who looked for his ass while he was mounted on his back.

Miguel de Cervantes
Gathering, Wool, Ass
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1993). “Don Quixote”, p.673, Wordsworth Editions

I would have nobody to control me; I would be absolute: and who but I? Now, he that is absolute can do what he likes; he that can do what he likes can take his pleasure; he that can take his pleasure can be content; and he that can be content has no more to desire. So the matter 's over; and come what will come, I am satisfied.

Miguel de Cervantes
Desire, Would Be, Matter
"Don Quixote de la Mancha". Book by Miguel de Cervantes, Part I, Book IV, Ch. 23, 1605.

What is bought is cheaper than a gift.

Miguel de Cervantes
Generosity, Credit, Cheaper

Faint heart ne'er won fair lady.

Miguel de Cervantes
Heart, Faint Of Heart, Fairs
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1749). “The History Of the Renowned Don Quixote De la Mancha”, p.71

Modesty, tis a virtue not often found among poets, for almost every one of them thinks himself the greatest in the world.

Miguel de Cervantes
Thinking, Poetry, Literature

It is past all controversy that what costs dearest is, and ought to be, most valued.

Miguel de Cervantes
Past, History, Cost
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1993). “Don Quixote”, p.270, Wordsworth Editions

Pray, look better, sir... those things yonder are no giants, but windmills.

Miguel de Cervantes
Giants, Looks, Literature
"Don Quixote".

It's up to brave hearts, sir, to be patient when things are going badly, as well as being happy when they're going well ... For I've heard that what they call fortune is a flighty woman who drinks too much, and, what's more, she's blind, so she can't see what she's doing, and she doesn't know who she's knocking over or who she's raising up.

Miguel de Cervantes
Heart, Brave, Too Much

I follow a more easy, and, in my opinion, a wiser course, namely--to inveigh against the levity of the female sex, their fickleness, their double-dealing, their rotten promises, their broken faith, and, finally, their want of judgment in bestowing their affections.

Miguel de Cervantes
Sex, Broken, Promise
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Quixote de la Mancha (don, fict.name.) (1833). “The history and adventures of the renowned don Quixote: from the Span., by T. Smollett. To which is prefixed a memoir of the author, by T. Roscoe. Illustr. by G. Cruikshank”, p.155

"He preaches well that lives well," quoth Sancho, "that's all the divinity I can understand."

Miguel de Cervantes
Life, Divinity, Wells
"Don-Quixote". Book by Miguel de Cervantes, 1615.

Be a terror to the butchers, that they may be fair in their weight; and keep hucksters and fraudulent dealers in awe, for the same reason.

Miguel de Cervantes
Fear, Integrity, Literature
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1822). “The History of the Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote of La Mancha ...”, p.93

All women are good - good for nothing, or good for something.

Miguel de Cervantes
Funny, Life, Epic

The beauty of some women has days and seasons, depending upon accidents which diminish or increase it; nay, the very passions of the mind naturally improve or impair it, and very often utterly destroy it.

Miguel de Cervantes
Passion, Mind, Increase

Roque...lined his men up and had them produce all the clothing, jewels, money, and other objects that they had stolen since the last time they had divided the spoils. Having made a hasty appraisal and reduced to terms of money those items that could not be divided, he split the whole into shares with such equity and exactitude that in not a single instance did he go beyond or fall short of a strict distributive justice. They were all well satisfied with the payment received, indeed they were quite well pleased; and Roque then turned to Don Quixote.

Miguel de Cervantes
Wisdom, Fall, Men

The knowledge of yourself will preserve you from vanity.

Miguel de Cervantes
Vanity, Preserves

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