Robert Burton quotes
Robert Burton (1577–1640): English scholar. The library holds 102 quotes by Robert Burton, drawn from Anatomy of Melancholy, Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader, The Anatomy of Melancholy and other works. The 60 below are the most quoted; search the library in the maker for the rest.
Often about: life, faith, health, nature, death, happiness
The best-known Robert Burton quotes
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He that will not when he may, When he will he shall have nay.
Quoted in Anatomy of Melancholy -
What can’t be cured must be endured.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 3 -
Make a virtue of necessity.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 3, Memb. 4, Subsect. 1 -
Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride a gallop.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 2 -
Every man hath a good and a bad angel attending on him in particular, all his life long.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
A mere madness, to live like a wretch and die rich.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 12 -
Idleness is an appendix to nobility.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 6 -
The fear of some divine and supreme powers keeps men in obedience.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
Like Aesop’s fox, when he had lost his tail, would have all his fellow foxes cut off theirs.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
The commonwealth of Venice in their armoury have this inscription: “Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war.”
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 6 -
Smile with an intent to do mischief, or cozen him whom he salutes.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
To enlarge or illustrate this power and effect of love is to set a candle in the sun.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
Homer himself must beg if he want means, and as by report sometimes he did “go from door to door and sing ballads, with a company of boys about him.”
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 4, Subsect. 6 -
Christ himself was poor… And as he was himself, so he informed his apostles and disciples, they were all poor, prophets poor, apostles poor.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 3 -
They are proud in humility; proud in that they are not proud.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 14 -
It is most true, stylus virum arguit,—our style bewrays us.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
But to enlarge or illustrate this power and effects of love is to set a candle in the sun.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
Cookery is become an art, a noble science; cooks are gentlemen.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 2 -
Aristotle said melancholy men of all others are most witty.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 3, Memb. 1, Subsect. 3 -
We can make majors and officers every year, but not scholars; kings can invest knights and barons, as Sigismund the emperor confessed.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 15 -
Hannibal, as he had mighty virtues, so had he many vices; he had two distinct persons in him.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
Like him in Aesop, he whipped his horses withal, and put his shoulder to the wheel.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 1, Memb. 2 -
Seneca thinks the gods are well pleased when they see great men contending with adversity.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 1 -
No cord nor cable can so forcibly draw, or hold so fast, as love can do with a twined thread.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 2, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
England is a paradise for women and hell for horses; Italy a paradise for horses, hell for women, as the diverb goes.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 3, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
As that great captain, Ziska, would have a drum made of his skin when he was dead, because he thought the very noise of it would put his enemies to flight.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
I say with Didacus Stella, a dwarf standing on the shoulders of a giant may see farther than a giant himself.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
As much valour is to be found in feasting as in fighting, and some of our city captains and carpet knights will make this good, and prove it.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 2 -
Were it not that they are loath to lay out money on a rope, they would be hanged forthwith, and sometimes die to save charges.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 12 -
Felix Plater notes of some young physicians, that study to cure diseases, catch them themselves, will be sick, and appropriate all symptoms they find related of others to their own persons.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 3, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
The Devil himself, which is the author of confusion and lies.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 1, Subsect. 3 -
Fear and sorrow are the true characters and inseparable companions of most melancholy.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
Rich men are indeed rather possessed by their money than possessors.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
Our wrangling lawyers… are so litigious and busy here on earth, that I think they will plead their clients’ causes hereafter,—some of them in hell.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
For “ignorance is the mother of devotion,” as all the world knows.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 1, Subsect. 2 -
They lard their lean books with the fat of others’ works.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
The miller sees not all the water that goes by his mill.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 3, Memb. 4, Subsect. 1 -
As he said in Machiavel, omnes eodem patre nati, Adam’s sons, conceived all and born in sin, etc. “We are by nature all as one, all alike, if you see us naked; let us wear theirs and they our clothes, and what is the difference?”
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 2 -
When they are at Rome, they do there as they see done.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 2, Subsect. 1 -
As clear and as manifest as the nose in a man’s face.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 3, Memb. 4, Subsect. 1 -
No rule is so general, which admits not some exception.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 3 -
Every man for himself, his own ends, the Devil for all.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 1, Memb. 3 -
I had not time to lick it into form, as a bear doth her young ones.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
Whil’st fortun’d favour’d; friends, you smil’d on me: But, when she fled, a friend I could not see.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
A term of life is set to every man, Which is but short; and pass it no one can.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
Like a hog, or dog in the manger, he doth only keep it because it shall do nobody else good, hurting himself and others.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subsect. 12 -
Fabricius finds certain spots and clouds in the sun.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 3 -
We can say nothing but what hath been said. Our poets steal from Homer… Our story-dressers do as much; he that comes last is commonly best.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
Melancholy advanceth men’s conceits more than any humour whatever.
The Anatomy of Melancholy -
Who cannot give good counsel? ’Tis cheap, it costs them nothing.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 3 -
And this is that Homer’s golden chain, which reacheth down from heaven to earth, by which every creature is annexed, and depends on his Creator.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 1, Memb. 2, Subsect. 1 -
Every schoolboy hath that famous testament of Grunnius Corocotta Porcellus at his fingers’ end.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 1, Memb. 1, Subsect. 1 -
Isocrates adviseth Demonicus, when he came to a strange city, to worship by all means the gods of the place.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 1, Subsect. 5 -
Gluttony is the source of all our infirmities and the fountain of all our diseases. As a lamp is choked by a superabundance of oil, a fire extinguished by an excess of fuel, so is the natural health of the body destroyed by intemperate diet.
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Many things happen between the cup and the lip.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part ii. Sect. 2, Memb. 3 -
Diogenes struck the father when the son swore.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 5 -
Where God hath a temple, the Devil will have a chapel.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 4, Memb. 1, Subsect. 1 -
He is only fantastical that is not in fashion.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii. Sect. 2, Memb. 2, Subsect. 3 -
I would help others, out of a fellow-feeling.
Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader -
Carcasses bleed at the sight of the murderer.
Anatomy of Melancholy, Part i. Sect. 1, Memb. 2, Subsect. 5
Where these quotes come from
- Anatomy of Melancholy (60 quotes)
- Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader (15 quotes)
- The Anatomy of Melancholy (10 quotes)
- Quoted in Anatomy of Melancholy (1 quote)
Every quote comes from a public-domain edition. How the library was made .