Women are but the toys which amuse our lighter hours---ambition is the serious business of life.
Walter ScottThere never will exist anything permanently noble and excellent in the character which is a stranger to resolute self-denial.
Walter ScottThere are those to whom a sense of religion has come in storm and tempest; there are those whom it has summoned amid scenes of revelry and idle vanity; there are those, too, who have heard its "still small voice" amid rural leisure and placid retirement. But perhaps the knowledge which causeth not to err is most frequently impressed upon the mind during the season of affliction.
Walter ScottAdversity is like the period of the rain. . . cold, comfortless, unfriendly to people and to animals; yet from that season have their birth the flower, the fruit, the date, the rose and the pomegranate.
Walter ScottSuccess or failure in business is caused more by the mental attitude even than by mental capacities.
Walter ScottMany miles away there's a shadow on the door of a cottage on the Shore of a dark Scottish lake.
Walter ScottIt is wonderful what strength of purpose and boldness and energy of will are roused by the assurance that we are doing our duty.
Walter ScottYou will, I trust, resemble a forest plant, which has indeed, by some accident, been brought up in the greenhouse, and thus rendered delicate and effeminate, but which regains its native firmness and tenacity, when exposed for a season to the winter air.
Walter ScottThe misery of keeping a dog is his dying so soon. But, to be sure, if he lived for fifty years and then died, what would become of me?
Walter ScottIn the name of God!" said Gurth, "how came they prisoners? and to whom?" "Our master was too ready to fight," said the Jester, "and Athelstane was not ready enough, and no other person was ready at all.
Walter ScottHe is the best sailor who can steer within fewest points of the wind, and exact a motive power out of the greatest obstacles.
Walter Scott"Lambe them, lads! lambe them!" a cant phrase of the time derived from the fate of Dr. Lambe, an astrologer and quack, who was knocked on the head by the rabble in Charles the First's time.
Walter ScottReal valor consists not in being insensible to danger; but in being prompt to confront and disarm it.
Walter ScottA ruin should always be protected but never repaired - thus may we witness full the lingering legacies of the past.
Walter ScottBreathes there the man with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land.
Walter ScottHonour is a homicide and a bloodspiller, that gangs about making frays in the street; but Credit is a decent honest man, that sits at hame and makes the pat play.
Walter ScottNever was flattery lost on a poet's ear; a simple race, they waste their toil for the vain tribute of a smile.
Walter ScottHeap on more wood! - the wind is chill; But let it whistle as it will, We'll keep our Christmas merry still.
Walter ScottAlthough too much of a soldier among sovereigns, no one could claim with better right to be a sovereign among soldiers.
Walter ScottThe playbill, which is said to have announced the tragedy of Hamlet, the character of the Prince of Denmark being left out.
Walter ScottIf you once turn on your side after the hour at which you ought to rise, it is all over. Bolt up at once.
Walter ScottIn prosperous times I have sometimes felt my fancy and powers of language flag, but adversity is to me at least a tonic and bracer.
Walter ScottI have heard men talk about the blessings of freedom," he said to himself, "but I wish any wise man would teach me what use to make of it now that I have it.
Walter ScottHe who indulges his sense in any excesses renders himself obnoxious to his own reason; and, to gratify the brute in him, displeases the man, and sets his two natures at variance.
Walter ScottGood wine needs neither bush nor preface to make it welcome. And they drank the red wine through the helmet barr'd.
Walter ScottThose who are too idle to read, save for the purpose of amusement, may in these works acquire some acquaintance with history, which, however inaccurate, is better than none.
Walter ScottA sound head, an honest heart, and an humble spirit are the three best guides through time and to eternity.
Walter ScottOne hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum, in which men steal through existence, like sluggish waters through a marsh, without either honor or observation.
Walter ScottDo not Christians and Heathens, and Jews and Gentiles, and poets and philosophers, unite in allowing the starry influences?
Walter Scott