Robert Burton Quotes & Sayings

I am not poor, I am not rich; nihil est, nihil deest, I have little, I want nothing: all my treasure is in Minerva's tower ... I live still a collegiate student ... and lead a monastic life, ipse mihi theatrum [sufficient entertainment to myself], sequestered from those tumults and troubles of the world ... aulae vanitatem, fori ambitionem, ridere mecum soleo [I laugh to myself at the vanities of the court, the intrigues of public life], I laugh at all. — Robert Burton

Those impious epicures, libertines, atheists, hypocrites, infidels, worldly, secure, impenitent, unthankful, and carnal-minded men, that attribute all to natural causes, that will acknowledge no supreme power; that have cauterized consciences, or live in a reprobate sense; or such desperate persons as are too distrustful of his mercies. — Robert Burton

A quiet mind cureth all. — Robert Burton

Now go and brag of thy present happiness, whosoever thou art, brag of thy temperature, of thy good parts, insult, triumph, and boast; thou seest in what a brittle state thou art, how soon thou mayst be dejected, how many several ways, by bad diet, bad air, a small loss, a little sorrow or discontent, an ague, &c.; how many sudden accidents may procure thy ruin, what a small tenure of happiness thou hast in this life, how weak and silly a creature thou art. — Robert Burton

Every man for himself, the devil for all. — Robert Burton

I would advise him that is actually melancholy not to read this tract of Symptoms, lest he disquiet or make himself for a time worse, and more melancholy than he was before. — Robert Burton

No cord or cable can draw so forcibly, or bind so fast, as [love] can do with a single thread. — Robert Burton

We love neither God nor our neighbor as we should. Our love in spiritual things is "too defective, in worldly things too excessive, there is a jar in both." We love the world too much; God too little; our neighbor not at all, or for our own ends. — Robert Burton

I light my candle from their torches. — Robert Burton

Idleness is an appendix to nobility. — Robert Burton

What is life, when wanting love? Night without a morning; love's the cloudless summer sun, nature gay adorning. — Robert Burton

that I have read many books, but to little purpose, for want of good method; I have confusedly tumbled over divers authors in our libraries, with small profit, for want of art, order, memory, judgment. — Robert Burton

Every man hath a good and a bad angel attending on him in particular all his life long. — Robert Burton

A good conscience is a continual feast, but a galled conscience is as great a torment as can possibly happen, a still baking oven (so Pierius in his Hieroglyph compares it), another hell. — Robert Burton

What cannot be cured must be endured. — Robert Burton

Be not solitary, be not idle — Robert Burton

He that increaseth wisdom, increaseth sorrow. — Robert Burton

One was never married, and that's his hell; another is, and that's his plague. — Robert Burton

I would desire to have no other prison than a library, and to be chained together with as many good authors. — Robert Burton

A blow with a word strikes deeper than a blow with a sword. — Robert Burton

[T]hou canst not think worse of me than I do of myself. — Robert Burton

Let thy fortune be what it will, 'tis thy mind alone that makes thee poor or rich, miserable or happy. — Robert Burton

No Centaurs here, or Gorgons look to find,
My subject is of man, and human kind. — Robert Burton

To enlarge or illustrate this power and effect of love is to set a candle in the sun. — Robert Burton

One religion is as true as another. — Robert Burton

When I lie waking all alone,
Recounting what I have ill done,
My thoughts on me then tyrannize,
Fear and sorrow me surprise,
Whether I tarry still or go,
Methinks the time moves very slow,
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so sad as melancholy.
'Tis my sole plague to be alone,
I am a beast, a monster grown,
I will no light nor company,
I find it now my misery.
The scene is turn'd, my joys are gone,
Fear, discontent, and sorrows come.
All my griefs to this are folly,
Naught so fierce as melancholy. — Robert Burton

Worldly wealth is the Devil's bait; and those whose minds feed upon riches recede, in general, from real happiness, in proportion as their stores increase, as the moon, when she is fullest, is farthest from the sun. — Robert Burton

If the world will be gulled, let it be gulled. — Robert Burton

The eyes are the harbingers of love, and the first step of love is sight. — Robert Burton

The men who succeed are the efficient few. They are the few who have the ambition and will power to develop themselves. — Robert Burton

What a glut of books! Who can read them? — Robert Burton

It is an old saying, "A blow with a word strikes deeper than a blow with a sword"; and many men are as much galled with a calumny, a scurrile and bitter jest, a libel, a pasquil, satire, apologue, epigram, stage-plays, or the like, as with any misfortune whatsoever. — Robert Burton

If you have no dreams, you shall live within them — Robert Burton

Old friends become bitter enemies on a sudden for toys and small offenses. — Robert Burton

All Poets are mad. — Robert Burton

A dwarf standing on the shoulders of a giant may see farther than a giant himself. — Robert Burton

No rule is so general, which admits not some exception. — Robert Burton

That which others hear or read of, I felt and practised myself; they get their knowledge by books, I mine by melancholizing. — Robert Burton

Melancholy can be overcome only by melancholy. — Robert Burton

Wine is strong, the king is strong, women are strong, but truth overcometh all things. — Robert Burton

Almost in every kingdom the most ancient families have been at first princes' bastards. — Robert Burton

If heaven be so fair,the sun so fair, how much fairer shall He be that made them fair? For by the greatness and beauty of the creatures, proportionally the maker of them is seen. — Robert Burton

As a fat body is more subject to diseases, so are rich men to absurdities and fooleries, to many casualties and cross inconveniences. — Robert Burton

We can make mayors and officers every year, but not scholars. — Robert Burton

If you like not my writing, go read something else. — Robert Burton