Izaak Walton Quotes

There are offences given and offences not given but taken.

Old-fashioned poetry, but choicely good.

Look to your health: and if you have it, praise God, and value it next to a good conscience; for health is the second blessing that we mortals are capable of; a blessing that money cannot buy; and therefore value it.

No man can lose what he never had.

The will of man is by his reason swayed.

And for winter fly-fishing it is as useful as an almanac out of date.

Words are men's daughters, but God's sons are things.

There is a wheel within a wheel; a secret sacred wheel of Providence (most visible in marriages), guided by His hand that allows not the race to the swift nor bread to the wise, nor good wives to good men: and He that can bring good out of evil (for mortals are blind to this reason) only knows why this blessing was denied to patient Job, to meek Moses, and to our as meek and patient Mr Hooker.

Good company and good discourse are the very sinews of virtue.

Angling may be said to be so like the mathematics that it can never be fully learned.

He that loses his conscience has nothing left that is worth keeping. Therefore be sure you look to that, and in the next place look to your health; and if you have it, praise God and value it next to a good conscience.

An excellent angler, and now with God.

He directed that the stone over his grave be inscribed: Hic jacet hujus sententiae primus auctor: DISPUTANDI PRURITUS ECCLESIARUM SCABIES.

I am, Sir, a brother of the angle.

Blessings we enjoy daily, and for the most of them, because they be so common, men forget to pay their praises. [and miss much of their benefits from grateful appreciation]

Angling is an art, and an art worth your learning.

I have known a very good, fisher angle diligently four or six hours for a river carp, and not have a bite.

And this, and many other like blessings, we enjoy daily. And for most of them, because they be so common, most men forget to pay their praises: but let not us, because it is a sacrifice so pleasing to Him that made that sun and us, and still protects us, and gives us flowers, and showers, and stomachs, and meat, and content, and leisure to go a-fishing.

That which is everybody's business is nobody's business.

Angling may be said to be so like the Mathematics that it can never be fully learnt; at least not so fully but that there will still be more new experiments left for the trial of other men that succeed us.

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter.

Let us not repine, or so much as think the gifts of God unequally dealt, if we see another abound with riches, when, as God knows, the cares that are the keys that keep those riches hang often so heavily at the rich man's girdle that they dog him with weary days and restless nights, even when others sleep quietly.

[T]is not all fishing to fish.

Lord, what music hast thou provided for Thy saints in heaven, when Thou affordest bad men such music on earth!

O, sir, doubt not that Angling is an art; is it not an art to deceive a trout with an artificial fly?

The person who loses their conscience has nothing left worth keeping.

We may say of angling, as Dr. Boteler said of strawberries, Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did; and so, if I might be judge, God never did make a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling.

This dish of meat is too good for any but anglers, or very honest men.

Doubtless God Could Have Made A Better Berry, But Doubtless God Never Did

It was wisely said, by a man of great observation, that there are as many miseries beyond riches as on this side of them.

God has two dwellings; one in heaven, and the other in a meek and thankful heart.

And though it is most certain, that two lutes being both strung and turned to an equal pitch, and then one played upon, the other will warble a faint audible harmony in answer to the same tune: yet many will not believe there is any such thing as sympathy of souls, and I am well pleased that every reader do enjoy his own opinion.

Angling is somewhat like poetry, men are to be born so.

You cannot lose what you never had.

I have laid aside business, and gone a'fishing.

So long as thou are ignorant be not ashamed to learn. Ignorance is the greatest of all infirmities, and when justified, the chiefest of all follies.

Let me tell you that every misery I miss is a new blessing.

[Be grateful for the simple things in life. Don't take them for granted. After all...] What would a blind man give to see the pleasant rivers and meadows and flowers and fountains; and this and many other like blessings we enjoy daily.

You will find angling to be like the virtue of humanity, which has a calmness of spirit and a world of blessing attending upon it.

As no man is born an artist, so no man is born an angler.

Those little nimble musicians of the air, that warble forth their curious ditties, with which nature hath furnished them to the shame of art.

God never did make a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling.

Blessings upon all that hate contention, and love quietnesse, and vertue, and Angling.

We see but the outside of a rich man's happiness; few consider him to be like the silkworm, that, when she seems to play, is at the very same time consuming herself.

Let me tell you that every misery I miss is a new blessing. [Not only be grateful for the good that you have but also for the bad you don't!]

It is agreed by most men, that the Eele is a most daintie fish; the Romans have esteemed her the Helena of their feasts, and some The Queen of pleasure.

Rivers and the inhabitants of the watery element were made for wise men to contemplate, and fools to pass by without consideration.

These poor rich men, we anglers pity them perfectly.