Quotes from Robert Burton

A good conscience is a continual feast.

When they are at Rome, they do there as they see done.

Where God hath a temple, the Devil will have a chapel.

Make a virtue of necessity.

England is a paradise for women and hell for horses; Italy a paradise for horses, hell for women, as the diverb goes.

Marriage and hanging go by destiny; matches are made in heaven.

Cornelia kept her in talk till her children came from school, "and these," said she, "are my jewels."

Every man for himself, his own ends, the Devil for all.

And this is that Homer's golden chain, which reacheth down from heaven to earth, by which every creature is annexed, and depends on his Creator.

England is a paradise for women and hell for horses; Italy is a paradise for horses, hell for women, as the proverb goes.

Idleness is an appendix to nobility.

[Ambitious men] may not cease, but as a dog in a wheel, a bird in a cage, or a squirrel in a chain, so Budaeus compares them; they climb and climb still, with much labour, but never make an end, never at the top.

They do not live but linger.

As much valour is to be found in feasting as in fighting, and some of our city captains and carpet knights will make this good, and prove it.

Cookery is become an art, a noble science; cooks are gentlemen.

Penny wise, pound foolish.

The commonwealth of Venice in their armory have this inscription: "Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war."

If there be a hell upon earth, it is to be found in a melancholy man's heart.

Hinc quam sic calamus saevior ense, patet. The pen worse than the sword.

See one promontory (said Socrates of old), one mountain, one sea, one river, and see all.

Restore a man to his health, his purse lies open to thee.

Diogenes struck the father when the son swore.

As a good housewife out of divers fleeces weaves one piece of cloth, a bee gathers wax and honey out of many flowers, and makes a new bundle of all... I have laboriously collected this Cento out of divers writers, and... I have wronged no authors, but given every man his own.... I can say of myself, Whom have I injured? The matter is theirs most part, and yet mine...

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