As the language of the face is universal, so ’tis very comprehensive; ’tis the shorthand of the mind, and crowds a great deal in a little room.
—Jeremy Collier (1650–1726) Anglican Church Historian, Clergyman
It has to be displayed, this face, on a more or less horizontal plane. Imagine a man wearing a mask, and imagine that the elastic which holds the mask on has just broken, so that the man (rather than let the mask slip off) has to tilt his head back and balance the mask on his real face. This is the kind of tyranny which Lawson’s face exerts over the rest of his body as he cruises along the corridors. He doesn’t look down his nose at you, he looks along his nose.
—James Fenton (b.1949) English Poet, Journalist
A man finds room in the few square inches of the face for the traits of all his ancestors; for the expression of all his history, and his wants.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
The features of our face are hardly more than gestures which force of habit made permanent. Nature, like the destruction of Pompeii, like the metamorphosis of a nymph into a tree, has arrested us in an accustomed movement.
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922) French Novelist
He had a face like a benediction.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
Truth makes the face of that person shine who speaks and owns it.
—Robert South (1634–1716) English Theologian, Preacher
The human face is the organic seat of beauty. It is the register of value in development, a record of Experience, whose legitimate office is to perfect the life, a legible language to those who will study it, of the majestic mistress, the soul.
—Eliza Farnham (1815–64) American Reformer, Writer
Your face is a book, where men may read strange matters.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Most of the luxuries, and many of the so-called comforts of life, are not only indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. Cultivate poverty like a garden herb, like sage. Do not trouble yourself much to get new things, whether clothes or friends. Turn the old; return to them. Things do not change; we change. The very simplicity and nakedness of man’s life in the primitive ages imply this advantage, at least, that they left him still but a sojourner in nature. To be awake is to be alive. Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. Every man is a builder of a temple, called his body, to the god he worships, after a style purely his own, nor can he get off by hammering marble instead. We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bones. Any nobleness begins at once to refine a man’s features, any meanness or sensuality to imbrute them. Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
The cheek is apter than the tongue to tell an errand.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
Look in the face of the person to whom you are speaking if you wish to know his real sentiments, for he can command his words more easily than his countenance.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
A countenance habitually under the influence of amiable feelings acquires a beauty of the highest order from the frequency with which such feelings stamp their character upon it.
—Sarah Josepha Hale (1788–1879) American Poet
The eyes those silent tongues of love.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
God had given you one face, and you make yourself another.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Was this the face that launched a thousand ships, and burnt the topless towers of Ileum?
—Christopher Marlowe (1564–93) English Playwright, Poet, Translator
Tom’s great yellow bronze mask all draped upon an iron framework. An inhibited, nerve-drawn; dropped face—as if hung on a scaffold of heavy private brooding; and thought.
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English Novelist
A man’s face is his autobiography. A woman’s face is her work of fiction.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
The face is the index of the mind.
—Common Proverb
All men’s faces are true, whatsoever their hands are.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
If you have a job without aggravations, you don’t have a job.
—Malcolm S. Forbes (1919–1990) American Publisher, Businessperson
I never forget a face, but in your case I’ll make an exception.
—Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American Actor, Comedian, Singer
People remain what they are, even when their faces fall to pieces.
—Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German Poet, Playwright, Theater Personality
When matters are desperate we must put on a desperate face.
—Robert Burns (1759–96) Scottish Poet, Songwriter
There are faces so fluid with expression, so flushed and rippled by the play of thought, that we can hardly find what the mere features really are.—When the delicious beauty of lineaments loses its power, it is because a more delicious beauty has appeared—that an interior and durable form has been disclosed.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Wicked thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mark on the face, especially the eyes.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German Philosopher
A man’s face as a rule says more, and more interesting things, than his mouth, for it is a compendium of everything his mouth will ever say, in that it is the monogram of all this man’s thoughts and aspirations.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German Philosopher
Alas after a certain age, every man is responsible for his own face.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Novelist
He had a face like a blessing.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
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