Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
Bible: John 15:13
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Bible: Matthew 22:37-40
Love seeketh not itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair.
Blake, William (1757 - 1827)
British poet. Songs of Experience, `The Clod and the Pebble', 1789
Love seeketh only Self to please,
To bind another to its delight,
Joys in another's loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite.
Blake, William
Songs of Experience, `The Clod and the Pebble', 1789
Although love dwells in gorgeous palaces, and sumptuous apartments, more willingly than in miserable and desolate cottages, it cannot be denied but that he sometimes causes his power to be felt in the gloomy recesses of forests, among the most bleak and rugged mountains, and in the dreary caves of a desert...
Boccaccio, Giovanni (1313 - 1375)
Italian writer and poet. Decameron, `Third Day'
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints - I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! - and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett (1806 - 1861)
British poet. Sonnets from the Portuguese, XLIII, 1850
Such ever was love's way; to rise, it stoops.
Browning, Robert (1812 - 1889)
British poet. A Death in the Desert, 1864
Green grow the rashes O,
Green grow the rashes O,
The sweetest hours that e'er I spend,
Are spent amang the lasses O!
Burns, Robert (1759 - 1796)
Scottish poet. Green Grow the Rashes
My love is like a red red rose
That's newly sprung in June:
My love is like the melodie
That's sweetly play'd in tune.
Burns, Robert
A Red, Red Rose
Gin a body meet a body
Coming through the rye;
Gin a body kiss a body,
Need a body cry?
Burns, Robert
Coming through the Rye
God is Love - I dare say. But what a mischievous devil Love is!
Butler, Samuel (1835 - 1902)
British writer. Notebooks, 1912
Of all the girls that are so smart
There's none like pretty Sally;
She is the darling of my heart
And she lives in our alley.
Carey, Henry (c. 1690 - 1743)
English poet and musician. Sally in our Alley
There ain't a lady livin' in the land
As I'd swop for my dear old Dutch!
Chevalier, Albert (1861 - 1923)
British music-hall artist. My Old Dutch
Many a man has fallen in love with a girl in a light so dim he would not have chosen a suit by it.
Chevalier, Maurice (1888 - 1972)
French singer and actor. Attrib., 1955
To the men and women who own men and women
those of us meant to be lovers
we will not pardon you
for wasting our bodies and time
Cohen, Leonard (1934)
Canadian poet. The Energy of Slaves
Love and a cottage! Eh, Fanny! Ah, give me indifference and a coach and six!
Colman,, George, the Elder (1732 - 1794)
British dramatist. The Clandestine Marriage, I:2, 1766
See how love and murder will out.
Congreve, William (1670 - 1729)
British Restoration dramatist. The Double Dealer, IV:6, 1694
Lord, what is a lover that it can give? Why one makes lovers as fast as one pleases, and they live as long as one pleases, and they die as soon as one pleases: and then if one pleases one makes more.
Congreve, William
The Way of the World, II:4, 1700
Say what you will, 'tis better to be left than never to have been loved.
Congreve, William
The Way of the World, II:1, 1700
Mad about the boy.
Coward, Noël (1899 - 1973)
British dramatist. Title of song
Love is a sickness full of woes,
All remedies refusing;
A plant that with most cutting grows,
Most barren with best using.
Why so?
More we enjoy it, more it dies;
If not enjoyed, it sighing cries,
Hey ho.
Daniel, Samuel (c. 1562 - 1619)
English poet and dramatist. Hymen's Triumph, I, 1614
It has been said that love robs those who have it of their wit, and gives it to those who have none.
Diderot, Denis (1713 - 1784)
French writer. Paradoxe sur le comédien, ?1765
Come live with me, and be my love,
And we will some new pleasures prove
Of golden sands, and crystal brooks,
With silken lines, and silver hooks.
Donne, John (1573 - 1631)
English poet. The Bait
I am two fools, I know,
For loving, and for saying so
In whining Poetry.
Donne, John
The Triple Fool
O my America! my new-found-land,
My Kingdom, safeliest when with one man man'd.
Donne, John
Elegies, 19, `Going To Bed'
It seems to me that he has never loved, that he has only imagined that he has loved, that there has been no real love on his part. I even think that he is incapable of love; he is too much occupied with other thoughts and ideas to become strongly attached to anyone earthly.
Dostoevsky, Anna (1846 - 1918)
Russian diarist and writer. Dostoevsky Portrayed by His Wife, 1887
And I was desolate and sick of an old passion.
Dowson, Ernest (1867 - 1900)
British lyric poet. Non Sum Qualis Eram Bonae Sub Regno Cynarae
You may not be an angel
'Cause angels are so few,
But until the day that one comes along
I'll string along with you.
Dubin, Al (20th century)
US songwriter. Twenty Million Sweethearts
All mankind love a lover.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803 - 1882)
US poet and essayist. Essays, `Love', ?1840
Don't you think I was made for you? I feel like you had me ordered - and I was delivered to you - to be worn - I want you to wear me, like a watch-charm or a button hole bouquet - to the world.
Fitzgerald, Zelda (1900 - 1948)
US writer. Letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1919, 1919
...I don't want to live - I want to love first, and live incidentally...
Fitzgerald, Zelda
Letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1919, 1919
Nowadays we don't think much of a man's love for an animal; we laugh at people who are attached to cats. But if we stop loving animals, aren't we bound to stop loving humans too?
Solzhenitsyn, Alexander (1918)
Soviet novelist. Cancer Ward, Pt. I, Ch. 20, 1968
A woman despises a man for loving her, unless she returns his love.
Stoddard, Elizabeth Drew (1823 - 1902)
US novelist and poet. Two Men, Ch. 32, 1888
I know she likes me,
'Cause she says so.
Stratton, Eugene (1861 - 1918)
British music-hall singer. The Lily of Laguna
I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord (1809 - 1892)
British poet. In Memoriam A.H.H., XXVII, 1850
Such a one do I remember, whom to look at was to love.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord
Locksley Hall, 1840
The rose was awake all night for your sake,
Knowing your promise to me;
The lilies and roses were all awake,
They sighed for the dawn and thee.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord
Maud, I, 1855
O tell her, brief is life but love is long.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord
The Princess, IV, 1847
God gives us love. Something to love
He lends us; but, when love is grown
To ripeness that on which it throve
Falls off, and love is left alone.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord
To J.S.
'Tis strange what a man may do, and a woman yet think him an angel.
Thackeray, William Makepeace (1811 - 1863)
British novelist. Henry Esmond, Ch. 7, 1852
All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love.
Tolstoy, Leo (1828 - 1910)
Russian writer. War and Peace, Bk. VII, Ch. 16, 1865-69
One can't live on love alone; and I am so stupid that I can do nothing but think of him.
Tolstoy, Sophie (1844 - 1919)
Russian writer. A Diary of Tolstoy's Wife, 1860-1891, 1862
Those who have courage to love should have courage to suffer.
Trollope, Anthony (1815 - 1882)
British novelist. The Bertrams, Ch. 27, 1859
I doubt whether any girl would be satisfied with her lover's mind if she knew the whole of it.
Trollope, Anthony
The Small House at Allington, Ch. 4, 1864
Walking My Baby Back Home.
Turk, Roy (20th century)
US songwriter. Title of song
Love conquers all things: let us too give in to Love.
Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro) (70 - 19 BC)
Roman poet. Eclogue, Bk. X, 37 BC
The boy I love is up in the gallery,
The boy I love is looking now at me.
Ware, George (19th century)
British songwriter. The Boy in the Gallery
It is like a cigar. If it goes out, you can light it again but/ it never tastes quite the same.
Wavell, Lord (1883 - 1950)
British field marshall. Attrib., 1943
Beware you be not swallowed up in books! An ounce of love is worth a pound of knowledge.
Wesley, John (1703 - 1791)
British religious leader. Life of Wesley (R. Southey), Ch. 16
I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love.
Duke of Windsor (1894 - 1972)
King of the United Kingdom; abdicated 1936. Radio broadcast, 11 Dec 1936, 1936
`Ah, love, love' he said. `Is there anything like it? Were you ever in love, Beach?' `Yes, sir, on one occasion, when I was a young under-footman. But it blew over.'
Wodehouse, P. G. (1881 - 1975)
British humorous novelist. Pigs Have Wings
There is a comfort in the strength of love;
`Twill make a thing endurable, which else
Would overset the brain, or break the heart.
Wordsworth, William (1770 - 1850)
British poet. Michael, 448, 1800
Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
Yeats, W. B. (1865 - 1939)
Irish poet. When you are Old
But Love has pitched his mansion in
The place of excrement.
Yeats, W. B.
Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop
A pity beyond all telling
Is hid in the heart of love.
Yeats, W. B.
The Pity of Love
