Birds sing in vain to the ear, flowers bloom in vain to the eye, of mortified vanity and galled ambition. He who would know repose in retirement must carry into retirement his destiny, integral and serene, as the Caesars transported the statue of Fortune into the chamber they chose for their sleep.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron LyttonRevenge is a common passion; it is the sin of the uninstructed.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron LyttonThere is no man so great as not to have some littleness more predominant than all his greatness. Our virtues are the dupes, and often only the plaything of our follies.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron LyttonWhen the world frowns, we can face it; but let it smile, and we are undone.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron LyttonBusiness dispatched is business well done, but business hurried is business ill done.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron LyttonGenius in the poet, like the nomad of Arabia, ever a wanderer, still ever makes a home where the well or the palm-tree invites it to pitch the tent. Perpetually passing out of himself and his own positive circumstantial condition of being into other hearts and into other conditions, the poet obtains his knowledge of human life by transporting his own life into the lives of others.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton