Catullus 2 Quotes & Sayings

Godlike the man who
sits at her side, who
watches and catches
that laughter
which (softly) tears me
to tatters: nothing is
left of me, each time
I see her ... — Catullus

When Catullus expresses his love and hate for Lesbia, he is not obviously voicing a wish to rid himself of one or the other of these two sentiments. Not all contradictions resolve into temporal change of belief or desire. — Raymond Geuss

Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred, then a thousand more. — Catullus

We see not our own backs. — Catullus

My sweetest Lesbia, let us live and love, And though the sager sort our deeds reprove, Let us not weigh them. Heaven's great lamps do dive Into their west, and straight again revive, But soon as once set is our little light, Then must we sleep one ever-during night. See Catullus 200:5. — Thomas Campion

They loved, and quarreled, and made up, and loved, and fought, and were true to each other and untrue. She made him the happiest man in the whole world and the most wretched, and after a few years she died, and then, when he was thirty, he died, too. But by that time Catullus had invented the love poem. — Tom Stoppard

Every one has his faults: but we do not see the wallet on our own backs. — Catullus

I hate and I love. Wherefore do I so, peradventure thou askest. I know not, but I feel it to be thus and I suffer. — Catullus

We should live, my Lesbia, and love
And value all the talk of stricter
Old men at a single penny.
Suns can set and rise again;
For us, once our brief light has set,
There's one unending night for sleeping.
Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred,
Then another thousand, then a second hundred,
Then still another thousand, then a hundred;
Then, when we've made many thousands,
We'll muddle them so as not to know
Or lest some villain overlook us
Knowing the total of our kisses.
(Translated by Guy Lee) — Catullus

To whom shall I offer this book, young and sprightly,
Neat, polished, wide-margined, and finished politely?
To you, my Cornelius, whose learning pedantic,
Has dared to set forth in three volumes gigantic
The history of ages - ye gods, what a labor!
And still to enjoy the small wit of a neighbor.
A man who can be light and learned at once, sir,
By life's subtle logic is far from a dunce, sir.
So take my small book - if it meet with your favor.
The passing of years cannot dull its sweet savor. — Catullus

I have lost you, my brother
And your death has ended
The spring season
Of my happiness,
our house is buried with you
And buried the laughter that you taught me.
There are no thoughts of love nor of poems
In my head
Since you died. — Catullus

I hate and I love, and who can tell me why? — Catullus

Genius now and then produces a lucky trifle. We still read the Dove of Anacreon, and Sparrow of Catullus; and a writer naturally pleases himself with a performance which owes nothing to the subject. — Samuel Johnson

The vows that woman makes to her fond lover are only fit to be written on air or on the swiftly passing stream. — Catullus

Away with you, water, destruction of wine! — Catullus

What a woman tells her lover in desire
should be written out on air & running water. — Catullus

I hate and I love
Why do I, you ask ?
I don't know, but it's happening
and it hurts — Catullus

My lady's sparrow is dead, the sparrow which was my lady's delight — Catullus

Oh, this age! How tasteless and ill-bred it is. — Catullus

So a maiden, while she remains untouched, remains dear to her own; but when she has lost her chaste flower with sullied body, she remains neither lovely to boys nor dear to girls. — Catullus

In perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale. (Forever and ever, brother, hail and farewell.) — Catullus

Come and let us live my Deare,
Let us love and never feare,
What the sowrest Fathers say:
Brightest Sol that dies to day
Lives againe as blithe to morrow,
But if we darke sons of sorrow
Set; o then, how long a Night
Shuts the Eyes of our short light!
Then let amorous kisses dwell
On our lips, begin and tell
A Thousand, and a Hundred, score
An Hundred, and a Thousand more,
Till another Thousand smother
That, and that wipe of another.
Thus at last when we have numbred
Many a Thousand, many a Hundred;
Wee'l confound the reckoning quite,
And lose our selves in wild delight:
While our joyes so multiply,
As shall mocke the envious eye. — Richard Crashaw

But you shall not escape my iambics. — Catullus

I write of youth, of love, and have access by these to sing of cleanly wantonness. — Catullus

Better a sparrow, living or dead, than no birdsong at all. — Catullus

My mind's sunk so low, Claudia, because of you, wrecked itself on your account so bad already, that I couldn't like you if you were the best of women, -or stop loving you, no matter what you do. — Catullus

Journeying over many seas & through many countries
I came dear brother to this pitiful leave-taking
The last gestures by your graveside
The futility of words over your quiet ashes.
Life cleft us from each other
Pointlessly depriving brother of brother
Accept then, our parents' custom
These offerings, this leave-taking
Echoing forever, brother, through a brother's tears — Catullus

What women say to lovers, you'll agree, One writes on running water or on air. — Catullus

Id Faciam
What I hate I love. Ask the crucified hand that holds
the nail that now is driven into itself, why. — Catullus

I hate and love. And why, perhaps you'll ask.
I don't know: but I feel, and I'm tormented. — Catullus