Horace Walpole Quotes

The farther I travel, the less I wonder at anything: a few days reconcile one to a new spot, or an unseen custom; and men are so much the same everywhere, that one scare perceives a change in situation.

There is no bombast, no similes, flowers, digressions, or unnecessary descriptions. Everything tends directly to the catastrophe.

Allen of Bath procured them the same honours from thence; and for some weeks it rained gold boxes: Chester, Worcester, Norwich, Bedford, Salisbury, Yarmouth, Tewkesbury, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Stirling, and other populous and chief towns following the example. Exeter, with singular affection, sent boxes of heart of oak.

The most remarkable thing I have observed since I came abroad, is, that there are no people so obviously mad as the English.

I fear no bad angel, and have offended no good one.

هذا العالم كوميديا للذين يفكرون ... و مأساة للذين يشعرون.

Foolish writers and readers are created for each other.

A tragedy can never suffer by delay: a comedy may, because the allusions or the manners represented in it maybe temporary.

The world is a tragedy to those who feel, but a comedy to those who think.

“Heaven,” replied Manfred, “does not send Heralds to question the title of a lawful Prince. I doubt whether it even notifies its will through Friars—but that is your affair, not mine.

Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not. A sense of humour was provided to console him for what he is.

A bystander often sees more of the game than those that play

He was persuaded he could know no happiness but in the society of one with whom he could for ever indulge the melancholy that had taken possession of his soul.

Rousseau's ideas of savage life are puerile. He is equally absurd in supposing that no people can be free, if they entrust their freedom to representatives. What is every body's business is nobody's business. The people would soon be sick of such freedom; they must attend to their own private business, else they could not live. The people of France are easily electrified. We are too solid for such dreams. Amber may draw straws: we do not gravitate so easily.

All very ancient history, except that of the illuminated Jews, is a perfect fable. It was written by priests, or collected from their reports; and calculated solely to raise lofty ideas of the origin of each nation. Gods and demi-gods were the principal actors; and truth is seldom to be expected where the personages are supernatural. The Greek historians have no advantage over the Peruvian, but in the beauty of their language, or from that language being more familiar to us. Mango Capac, the son of the sun, is as authentic a founder of a royal race, as the progenitor of the Heraclidae. What truth indeed could be expected, when even the identity of person is uncertain? The actions of one were ascribed to many, and of many to one. It is not known whether there was a single Hercules or twenty.