Why are old lovers able to become friends? Two reasons; They never really loved each other, or they love each other still.
—Indian Proverb
The sexual embrace can only be compared with music and with prayer.
—Havelock Ellis (1859–1939) British Sexologist, Physician, Social Reformer
You can be as romantic as you please about love, Hector; but you mustn’t be romantic about money
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
But true love is a durable fire,
In the mind ever burning,
Never sick, never old, never dead,
From itself never turning.
—Walter Raleigh (1552–1618) English Courtier, Navigator, Poet
Love has features which pierce all hearts, he wears a bandage which conceals the faults of those beloved. He has wings, he comes quickly and flies away the same.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
I’m a romantic; a sentimental person thinks things will last; a romantic person hopes against hope that they won’t.
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American Novelist
The most precious possession that ever comes to a man in this world is a woman’s heart.
—Josiah Gilbert Holland (1819–81) American Editor, Novelist
I feel within me the future life. I am like a forest that has been razed; the new shoots are stronger and brisker. I shall most certainly rise toward the heavens. The sun’s rays bathe my head. The earth gives me its generous sap, but the heavens illuminate me with the reflection of-of worlds unknown. Some say the soul results merely from bodily powers. Why, then, does my soul become brighter when my bodily powers begin to waste away? Winter is above me, but eternal spring is within my heart. I inhale even now the fragrance of lilacs, violets, and roses, just as I did when I was twenty. The nearer my approach to the end, the plainer is the sound of immortal symphonies of worlds which invite me. It is wonderful yet simple. It is a fairy tale; it is history. For half a century I have been writing my thoughts in prose and in verse; history, philosophy, drama, romance, tradition, satire, ode, and song; all of these have I tried. But I feel that I haven’t given utterance to the thousandth part of what lies within me. When I go to the grave I can say as others have said, “I have finished my day’s work.” But I cannot say, “I have finished my life.” My day’s work will begin again the next morning. The tomb is not a blind alley; it is a thoroughfare. It closes on the twilight, but opens on the dawn.
—Victor Hugo (1802–85) French Novelist
Love stories are only fit for the solace of people in the insanity of puberty. No healthy adult human being can really care whether so-and-so does or does not succeed in satisfying his physiological uneasiness by the aid of some particular person or not.
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947) English Occultist, Mystic, Magician
Many works of fiction may be read with safety; some even with profit; but the constant familiarity, even with such as are not exceptionable in themselves, relaxes the mind, which needs hardening; dissolves the heart, which wants fortifying; stirs the imagination, which wants quieting; irritates the passions, which want calming; and, above all, disinclines and disqualifies for active virtues and for spiritual exercises. The habitual indulgence in such reading, is a silent mining mischief. Though there is no act, and no moment, in which any open assault on the mind is made, yet the constant habit performs the work of a mental atrophy—it produces all the symptoms of decay; and the danger is not less for being more gradual, and therefore less suspected.
—Hannah More
Talk not of wasted affection; affection never was wasted.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–82) American Poet, Educator, Academic
The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, nor the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when he discovers that someone else believes in him and is willing to trust him with his friendship.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Love withers with predictability; its very essence is surprise and amazement. To make love a prisoner of the mundane is to take its passion and lose it forever.
—Leo Buscaglia (1924–98) American Motivational Speaker
A historical romance is the only kind of book where chastity really counts.
—Barbara Cartland (1901–2000) English Popular Romantic Novelist
Is not a kiss the very autograph of love?
You love simply because you cannot help it
—Unknown
True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen.
—Francois de La Rochefoucauld (1613–80) French Writer
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen nor even touched, but just felt in the heart.
—Helen Keller (1880–1968) American Author
The word love can be explained in thousands of ways, but the only word that comes to my mind is you.
—Unknown
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Some people come into our lives and quickly go.
Some people move our souls to dance.
They awaken us to new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom.
Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon.
They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, nd we are never ever the same.
—Flavia Weedn
Youth cannot imagine romance apart from youth.
—Booth Tarkington (1869–1946) American Novelist, Dramatist
Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. … It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.
—Erica Jong (b.1942) American Novelist, Feminist
And what’s romance? Usually, a nice little tale where you have everything As You Like It, where rain never wets your jacket and gnats never bite your nose and it’s always daisy-time.
—D. H. Lawrence (1885–1930) English Novelist, Playwright, Poet, Essayist, Literary Critic
To be in love is merely to be In a state of perpetual anesthesia:
To mistake an ordinary young man for a Greek god Or an ordinary young woman for a goddess.
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
Thou art to me a delicious torment.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
No matter where you go, however far away, a part of me will be with you and a part of you, with me, will stay
But to see her was to love her, love but her, and love her forever
As for me, to love you alone, to make you happy, to do nothing which would contradict your wishes, this is my destiny and the meaning of my life.
—Napoleon I (1769–1821) Emperor of France
Only passions, great passions, can elevate the soul to great things.
—Denis Diderot (1713–84) French Philosopher, Writer
So, fall asleep love, loved by me….for I know love, I am loved by thee.
—Robert Browning (1812–89) English Poet
For Love is Immortality.
—Emily Dickinson (1830–86) American Poet
Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.
—Erich Fromm (1900–80) German-American Psychoanalyst, Social Philosopher
I only wish to be the fountain of love from which you drink, every drop promising eternal passion.
—Anonymous
The world is no longer a romantic place. Some of its people still are however, and therein lies the promise. Don’t let the world win.
—John Cage (1912–92) American Composer
But some love not the method of your first; Romance they count it, throw’t away as dust; If I should meet with such, what should I say; Must I slight them as they slight me, or nay
—John Buchan, 1st Baron Tweedsmuir (1875–1940) Scottish Novelist, Politician, Diplomat
Are you conscious of the restful influence which the stars exert? To me they are the most soothing things in Nature. I am proud to say that I don’t now the name of one of them. The glamour and romance would pass away from them if they were all classified and ticketed in one’s brain. But when man is hot and flurried, and full of his own little ruffled dignities and infinitesimal misfortunes, then a star bath is the finest thing in the world.
—Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930) Scottish Writer
With reference to the narrative of events, far from permitting myself to derive it from the first source that came to hand, I did not even trust my own impressions, but it rests partly on what I saw myself, partly on what others saw for me, the accuracy of the report being always tried by the most severe and detailed tests possible. My conclusions have cost me some labor from the want of coincidence between accounts of the same occurrences by different eyewitnesses, arising sometimes from imperfect memory, sometimes from undue partiality for one side or the other. The absence of romance in my history will, I fear, detract somewhat from its interest; but I shall be content if it is judged useful by those inquirers who desire an exact knowledge of the past as an aid to the interpretation of the future, which in the course of human things must resemble if it does not reflect it. My history has been composed to be an everlasting possession, not the showpiece of an hour.
—Thucydides (c.455?c.400 BCE) Greek Historian
Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore; only the life I have lived. The pain now is part of the happiness then.
—Anthony Hopkins (b.1937) Welsh-born American Film, Stage Actor
The secret of love is seeking variety in your life together, and never letting routine chords dull the melody of your romance.
—Unknown
We are most alive when we’re in love
—John Updike (1932–2009) American Novelist, Poet, Short-Story Writer
O for the gentleness of old Romance, the simple planning of a minstrel’s song!
—John Keats (1795–1821) English Poet
The life of man is the true romance, which when it is valiantly conduced, will yield the imagination a higher joy than any fiction.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Love me without fear –
Trust me without questioning –
Need me without demanding –
Want me without restrictions –
Accept me without change –
Desire me without inhibitions.
—Dick Sutphen
He is not a lover who does not love forever.
—Euripides (480–406 BCE) Ancient Greek Dramatist
In our lives there is a simple colour, as on an artists palatte, which provides the meaning of life and art. it is the colour of love.
—Marc Chagall (1889–1985) Russian-born French Painter, Graphic Artist
I never, till now, had a friend who could give me repose; all have disturbed me, and, whether for pleasure or pain, it was still disturbance. But peace verflows from your heart into mine
—Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–64) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
She who makes her husband and her children happy, who reclaims the one from vice, and trains up the other to virtue, is a much greater character than the ladies described in romance, whose whole occupation is to murder mankind with shafts from their quiver or their eyes.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love. Everything is united by it alone. Love is God, and to die means that I, a particle of love, shall return to the general and eternal source.
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian Novelist
Love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired.
—Robert Frost (1874–1963) American Poet
Marriage is a romance in which the hero dies in the first chapter.
—Unknown
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.
—Thornton Wilder (1897–1975) American Novelist, Playwright