All men’s faces are true, whatsoever their hands are.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
He had a face like a blessing.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
A good face is a letter of recommendation.
—Common Proverb
Truth makes the face of that person shine who speaks and owns it.
—Robert South (1634–1716) English Theologian, Preacher
We can see nothing whatever of the soul unless it is visible in the expression of the countenance; one might call the faces at a large assembly of people a history of the human soul written in a kind of Chinese ideograms.
—Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–99) German Philosopher, Physicist
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, Essayist, Novelist, Author
The loveliest faces are to be seen by moonlight, when one sees half with the eye, and half with the fancy.
—Christian Nestell Bovee (1820–1904) American Writer, Aphorist
The faces of most American women over thirty are relief maps of petulant and bewildered unhappiness.
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American Novelist
When matters are desperate we must put on a desperate face.
—Robert Burns (1759–96) Scottish Poet, Songwriter
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
I am the family face; flesh perishes, I live on, projecting trait and trace through time to times anon, and leaping from place to place over oblivion.
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928) English Novelist, Poet
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
God had given you one face, and you make yourself another.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Clowns wear a face that’s painted intentionally on them so they appear to be happy or sad. What kind of mask are you wearing today?
—Unknown
I never forget a face, but in your case I’ll make an exception.
—Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American Actor, Comedian, Singer
I more and more see this, that we judge men’s abilities less from what they say or do, than from what they look. Tis the man’s face that gives him weight. His doings help, but not more than his brow.
—Charles Buxton (1823–71) British Politician, Writer
After a certain number of years our faces become our biographies. We get to be responsible for our faces.
—Cynthia Ozick (b.1928) American Novelist, Short-story Writer, Essayist
If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
I think your whole life shows in your face and you should be proud of that.
—Lauren Bacall (1924–2014) American Film Actress
Her face was her chaperone.
—Rupert Hughes (1872–1956) American Historian, Novelist, Film Director, Composer
The cheek is apter than the tongue to tell an errand.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Features are the visible expression of the soul.—the outward manifestation of the feeling and character within.
—Tryon Edwards American Theologian
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
A cheerful face is nearly as good for an invalid as healthy weather.
—Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) American Political Leader, Inventor, Diplomat
Was this the face that launched a thousand ships, and burnt the topless towers of Ileum?
—Christopher Marlowe (1564–93) English Playwright, Poet, Translator
A woman who could always love would never grow old; and the love of mother and wife would often give or preserve many charms if it were not too often combined with parental and conjugal anger. There remains in the faces of women who are naturally serene and peaceful, and of those rendered so by religion, an after-spring, and later an after-summer, the reflex of their most beautiful bloom.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
Every European visitor to the United States is struck by the comparative rarity of what he would call a face, by the frequency of men and women who look like elderly babies. If he stays in the States for any length of time, he will learn that this cannot be put down to a lack of sensibility—the American feels the joys and sufferings of human life as keenly as anybody else. The only plausible explanation I can find lies in his different attitude to the past. To have a face, in the European sense of the word, it would seem that one must not only enjoy and suffer but also desire to preserve the memory of even the most humiliating and unpleasant experiences of the past.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
There is in every human countenance, either a history or a prophecy, which must sadden, or at least soften, every reflecting observer.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English Poet, Literary Critic, Philosopher
Time engraves our faces with all the tears we have not shed.
—Natalie Clifford Barney (1876–1972) American Playwright, Poet, Novelist
He had a face like a benediction.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
The face is the index of the mind.
—Common Proverb
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
It is only at the first encounter that a face makes its full impression on us.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German Philosopher
The eyes those silent tongues of love.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
A strange and somewhat impassive physiognomy is often, perhaps, an advantage to an orator, or leader of any sort, because it helps to fix the eye and fascinate the mind.
—Charles Cooley (1864–1929) American Sociologist
In thy face I see the map of honor, truth, and loyalty.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
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
If you have a job without aggravations, you don’t have a job.
—Malcolm S. Forbes (1919–1990) American Publisher, Businessperson
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
That same face of yours looks like the title-page to a whole volume of roguery.
—Colley Cibber (1671–1757) English Playwright, Poet, Actor
It is the common wonder of all men, how among so many million faces, there should be none alike.
—Thomas Browne (1605–82) English Author, Physician
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
Our masks, always in peril of smearing or cracking, in need of continuous check in the mirror or silverware, keep us in thrall to ourselves, concerned with our surfaces.
—Carolyn Kizer (1925–2014) American Poet, Essayist, Translator
The tartness of his face sours ripe grapes.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Your face is a book, where men may read strange matters.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
People remain what they are, even when their faces fall to pieces.
—Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German Poet, Playwright, Theater Personality
Every man over forty is responsible for his face.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
A face is too slight a foundation for happiness.
—Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689–1762) English Aristocrat, Poet, Novelist, Writer