19th century

Explore 1787 quotes from the 19th century

And here, poor fool! with all my lore
I stand! no wiser than before.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Faust

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Topic

Useless facts

Speaker

Faust

Author

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Source

Faust

Medium

Play

Genre

Tragedy (play) Tragedy

Language

German

Time

1808 1800s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Faust. Eine Tragödie [Faust: A Tragedy]. Tübingen: J. G. Cotta’schen Buchhandlung, 1808.

Current Citation

Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Faust, Part One, edited by David Luke. Oxford University Press, 2008.

I love those who yearn for the impossible.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Faust

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Topic

Thinking big

Speaker

Manto

Author

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Source

Faust

Medium

Play

Genre

Tragedy (play) Tragedy

Language

German

Time

1808 1800s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Faust. Der Tragödie zweiter Teil [Faust. The Tragedy's Second Part]. 1832, act 2.

Current Citation

Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Faust: Part Two, translated by David Luke. Oxford University Press, 2008, act 2.

Great blunders are often made, like large ropes, of a multitude of fibers.

Victor Hugo

Les Miserables

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Topic

Mistakes

Author

Victor Hugo

Source

Les Miserables

Medium

Novel

Language

French

Time

1862 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Hugo, Victor. Les Misérables. Vol. 2, Bruxelles: A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven & Cie, 1862, bk. 5, ch. 10.

Current Citation

Hugo, Victor. Les Misérables. Wordsworth Editions, 1994, pt. 2, bk. 5, ch. 10.

When the peremptory challenges were all exhausted, a jury of twelve men was impaneled—a jury who swore they had neither heard, read, talked about nor expressed an opinion concerning a murder which the very cattle in the corrals, the Indians in the sage-brush and the stones in the streets were cognizant of!

Mark Twain

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Topic

Jury system

Author

Mark Twain

Genre

Travel literature

Language

English

Time

1872 1870s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Twain, Mark. Roughing It. Hartford: American Publishing Company, 1872, ch. 48.

Current Citation

Twain, Mark. Roughing It. Signet, 2008, ch. 48.

We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it—and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again—and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one any more.

Mark Twain

Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World

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Topic

Learning from experience Learning

Author

Mark Twain

Source

Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World

Genre

Travel writing

Language

English

Time

1897 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Twain, Mark. Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World. Hartford: American Publishing Company, 1897, ch. 11.

Current Citation

Twain, Mark. "Following the Equator." Mark Twain: A Tramp Abroad, Following the Equator, Other Travels, edited by Roy Blount Jr. Library of America, 2010, ch. 11.

To know is nothing at all; to imagine is everything.

Anatole France

The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard

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Topic

Imagination Knowledge

Speaker

Fairy

Author

Anatole France

Source

The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard

Medium

Novel

Language

French

Time

1881 1880s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

France, Anatole. Le Crime de Sylvestre Bonnard [The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard]. Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1881, pt. 2, ch. 2.

Anyone's death always releases something like an aura of stupefaction, so difficult is it to grasp this irruption of nothingness and to believe that it has actually taken place.

Gustave Flaubert

Madame Bovary

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Topic

Death

Author

Gustave Flaubert

Source

Madame Bovary

Medium

Novel

Language

French

Time

1857 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Madame Bovary: Moeurs de Province [Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners]. Revue de Paris, 1 Oct. 1856 - 15 Dec. 1856. Serial.

Current Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Madame Bovary, edited and translated by Lydia Davis. Penguin Classics, 2011, pt. 3, ch. 9.

The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom.

Arthur Schopenhauer

What a Man Is

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Topic

Obstacles to happiness Happiness

Author

Arthur Schopenhauer

Source

What a Man Is Parerga and Paralipomena

Language

German

Time

1851 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Schopenhauer, Arthur. "Aphorismen zu Lebensweisheit: Bon Dem, was Einer ist [Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life: What a Man is]." Parerga und Paralipomena. Vol. 1, Berlin: Druck und Verlag von U. W. Haan, 1851.

Current Citation

Schopenhauer, Arthur. "Aphorisms on the wisdom of life." Parerga and Paralipomena, translated by Sabine Roehr and Christopher Janaway. Vol. 1, Cambridge University Press, 2016.

To marry is to halve your rights and double your duties.

Arthur Schopenhauer

On Women

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Topic

Marriage

Author

Arthur Schopenhauer

Source

On Women Parerga and Paralipomena

Language

German

Time

1819 1810s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Schopenhauer, Arthur. "Ueber die Weiber [On Women]." Parerga und Paralipomena. Vol. 2, Berlin: Druck und Verlag von U. W. Haan, 1851.

Current Citation

Schopenhauer, Arthur. "On Women." Parerga and Paralipomena, translated by Adrian Del Caro and Christopher Janaway. Vol. 2, Cambridge University Press, 2017.

Axiom: hatred of the bourgeois is the beginning of wisdom.

Gustave Flaubert

Letters of Gustave Flaubert

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Topic

Bourgeoisie Class warfare

Author

Gustave Flaubert

Source

Letters of Gustave Flaubert

Medium

Letter

Language

French

Time

1867 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Letter to George Sand. 17 May 1867.

Current Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Flaubert-Sand: The Correspondence, translated by Francis Steegmuller. Knopf, 1993, no. 77.

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Solitude

More information about this quote

Topic

Crying

Author

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Source

Solitude

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1883 1880s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler. "Solitude." The New York Sun, Feb. 1883.

Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.

Herman Melville

Moby-Dick; or, The Whale

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Topic

Revenge

Author

Herman Melville

Source

Moby-Dick; or, The Whale

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1851 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. London: Richard Bentley/New York: Harper & Brothers, 1851, ch. 135.

Current Citation

Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick or, The Whale. Penguin Classics, 2002, ch. 135.

The absurd... The fact that with God everything is possible. The absurd does not belong to the distinctions that lie within the proper compass of the understanding. It is not identical with the improbable, the unexpected, the unforeseen.

Soren Kierkegaard

Fear and Trembling

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Topic

The absurd

Author

Soren Kierkegaard

Source

Fear and Trembling

Genre

Philosophical literature

Language

Danish

Time

1843 1840s 19th century

Authentication Score 1

Original Citation

Kierkegaard, Soren [published as Johannes de silentio]. Frygt og Bæven [Fear and Trembling]. Copenhagen: C. A. Reitzel, 1843.

Current Citation

Kierkegaard, Soren. Fear and Trembling, translated by Alastair Hannay. Penguin Classics, 1986.

The first virtue of a painting is to be a feast for the eyes.

Eugène Delacroix

More information about this quote

Topic

Purpose of art Painting Art

Author

Eugène Delacroix

Medium

Personal journal

Language

French

Time

1863 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Delacroix, Eugene. Journal entry. 22 June 1863.

Current Citation

Delacroix, Eugène. The Journal of Eugène Delacroix: A Selection, translated by Lucy Norton, edited by Hubert Wellington. Phaidon, 1995.

The man who really counts in the world is the doer, not the mere critic, the man who actually does the work, even if roughly and imperfectly, not the man who only talks or writes about how it ought to be done.

Theodore Roosevelt

More information about this quote

Topic

Words vs. actions Critics

Author

Theodore Roosevelt

Language

English

Time

1891 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr. Historic Towns: New York. London and New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1891, ch. 14.

Of all God's creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the lash. That one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat.

Mark Twain

More information about this quote

Topic

Cats

Author

Mark Twain

Source

Journals of Mark Twain

Medium

Personal journal

Language

English

Time

1894 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Twain, Mark. Mark Twain's Notebook, edited by Albert Bigelow Paine. The Mark Twain Company, 1932, ch. 21. Originally from Notebook, 2 Feb. 1894.

The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.

Abraham Lincoln

Second Annual Message to Congress

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Topic

Solving problems Adaptability Changing with the times American Civil War

Speaker

Abraham Lincoln

Source

Second Annual Message to Congress

Medium

Speech

Genre

Political speech

Language

English

Time

1862 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Lincoln, Abraham. Second Annual Message to Congress. 1 Dec. 1862, US Congress, US Capitol Building, Washington, DC, USA.

Current Citation

Lincoln, Abraham. "Annual Message to Congress, December 1, 1862." Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1859-1865, edited by Don E. Fehrenbacher. Library of America, 1989.

I have never been more struck by the good sense and the practical judgment of the Americans than in the manner in which they elude the numberless difficulties resulting from their Federal Constitution.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Democracy in America

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Topic

US Constitution American character

Author

Alexis de Tocqueville

Source

Democracy in America

Genre

Political literature

Language

French

Time

1835 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. De La Democratie en Amerique [Democracy in America]. Vol. 1, London: Saunders and Otley, 1835, ch. 8, pt. 5.

Current Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. Democracy in America: The Complete and Unabridged Volumes I and II, translated by Henry Reeve. Bantam Classics, 2000, vol. 1, ch. 8, pt. 5.

There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons--
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes.

Emily Dickinson

More information about this quote

Topic

Winter

Author

Emily Dickinson

Source

Winter Poems

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1886 1880s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Dickinson, Emily. "Winter." Poems. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1890, I. 1.

Current Citation

Dickinson, Emily. "There's a certain Slant of light." Emily Dickinson’s Poems: As She Preserved Them, edited by Cristanne Miller. Belknap Press, 2016, I. 1.

If I owned Texas and Hell, I would rent Texas and live in Hell.

Philip Henry Sheridan

More information about this quote

Topic

Texas

Speaker

Philip Henry Sheridan

Language

English

Time

1866 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Sheridan, Philip Henry. Quoted in The Pittsburgh Gazette. Mar. 1866.