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If you don't do it, you'll never know what would have happened if you had done it.

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Jul 26, 2026

Quotes: 53419
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Steady of heart and stout of hand.
Sir Walter Scott

Quote Author: Sir Walter Scott

Sir Walter Scott

Sir Walter Scott
(1771-1832)

Other Sir Walter Scott Quotes

Success or failure in business is caused more by the mental attitude even than by mental capacities.

A man may drink and not be drunk; A man may fight and not be slain; A man may kiss a bonny lass, And yet be welcome home again.

Ambition breaks the ties of blood, And forgets the obligations of gratitude.

He that climbs the tall tree has won right to the fruit, He that leaps the wide gulf should prevail in his suit.

Hope is brightest when it dawns from fears.

Is death the last step? No, it is the final awakening.

The half hour between waking and rising has all my life proved propitious to any task which was exercising my invention...It was always when I first opened my eyes that the desired ideas thronged upon me.

When a man has not a good reason for doing a thing, he has one good reason for letting it alone.

To all, to each, a fair good-night, And pleasing dreams, and slumbers light.

Like the dew on the mountain, Like the foam on the river, Like the bubble on the fountain, Thou art gone, and for ever!

Thus pleasures fade away; Youth, talents, beauty, thus decay, And leave us dark, forlorn, and gray.

O what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive.

We shall never learn to feel and respect our real calling and destiny, unless we have taught ourselves to consider every thing as moonshine, compared with the education of the heart.

Tears are the softening showers which cause the seed of heaven to spring up in the human heart.

Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, And men below, and saints above: For love is heaven, and heaven is love.

O! many a shaft, at random sent, Finds mark the archer little meant! And many a word, at random spoken, May soothe or wound a heart that's broken!

One 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.

If you have no friends to share or rejoice in your success in life — if you cannot look back to those whom you owe gratitude, or forward to those to whom you ought to afford protection, still it is no less incumbent on you to move steadily in the path of duty; for your active excretions are due not only to society; but in humble gratitude to the Being who made you a member of it, with powers to save yourself and others.

On his bold visage middle age Had slightly press'd its signet sage, Yet had not quench'd the open truth And fiery vehemence of youth: Forward and frolic glee was there, The will to do, the soul to dare.

The way was long, the wind was cold, The Minstrel was infirm and old; His withered cheek, and tresses gray, Seemed to have know a better day.

Thus aged men, full loth and slow, The vanities of life forego, And count their youthful follies o'er, Till Memory lends her light no more.

Just at the age 'twixt boy and youth, When thought is speech, and speech is truth.

And dar'st thou then To beard the lion in his den, The Douglas in his hall?

Where, where was Roderick then? One blast upon his bugle horn Were worth a thousand men.

Bluid is thicker than water.

Such is the custom of Branksome Hall.

O Caledonia! stern and wild, Meet nurse for a poetic child! Land of brown heath and shaggy wood; Land of the mountain and the flood!

'Charge, Chester, charge! on, Stanley, on!' Were the last words of Marmion.

Come as the winds come, when Forests are rended; Come as the waves come, when Navies are stranded.

Come one, come all! this rock shall fly From its firm base as soon as I.

Stood for his country’s glory fast, And nailed her colors to the mast!

Where 's the coward that would not dare To fight for such a land?

In man's most dark extremity Oft succour dawns from Heaven.

That day of wrath, that dreadful day. When heaven and earth shall pass away.

And come he slow, or come he fast, It is but Death who comes at last.

Upon the death of his wife: May 16 [1826]— She died at nine in the morning, after being ill for two days—easy at last. I arrived here late last night. For myself, I scarce know how I feel — sometimes as firm as the Bass Rock, sometimes as weak as the wate

Oh what a tangled web we weave When first we practise to deceive.

And better had they ne'er been born, Who read to doubt, or read to scorn.

Oh for a blast of that dread horn On Fontarabian echoes borne!

Sea of upturned faces.

The Book of Books Within this ample volume lies The mystery of mysteries. Happiest they of human race To whom their God has given grace To read, to fear, to hope, to pray, To lift the latch, to force the way; But better had they ne’er been born That read to doubt or read to scorn.

I’ll make thee famous by my pen, And glorious by my sword.

Fat, fair, and forty.

Some feelings are to mortals given With less of earth in them than heaven.

There is a southern proverb — fine words butter no parsnips.

Ne'er Was flattery lost on poet's ear; A simple race! they waste their toil For the vain tribute of a smile.

A foot more light, a step more true, Ne'er from the heath-flower dash'd the dew.

Art thou a friend to Roderick?

Nothing is more completely the child of art than a garden.

Oh, Brignall banks are wild and fair, And Greta woods are green, And you may gather garlands there Would grace a summer's queen.

Profan'd the God-given strength, and marr'd the lofty line.

Like the dew on the mountain, Like the foam on the river, Like the bubble on the fountain, Thou art gone, and forever!

To all, to each, a fair good-night, And pleasing dreams, and slumbers light!

When a man hasn't a good reason for doing a thing, he has a good reason for letting it alone.

There 's a gude time coming.

Good wine needs neither bush nor preface To make it welcome.

And ne'er did Grecian chisel trace A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace Of finer form or lovelier face.

Hail to the chief who in triumph advances!

The happy combination of fortuitous circumstances.

O fading honours of the dead! O high ambition, lowly laid!

Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife! To all the sensual world proclaim, One crowded hour of glorious life Is worth an age without a name.

O woman! in our hours of ease Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, And variable as the shade By the light quivering aspen made; When pain and anguish wring the brow, A ministering angel thou!

For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war, Was to wed the fair Ellen of Lochinvar.

When Israel, of the Lord belov'd, Out of the land of bondage came, Her fathers' God before her mov'd, An awful guide in smoke and flame.

What can they see in the longest kingly line in Europe, save that it runs back to a successful soldier?

'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.

But search the land of living men, Where wilt thou find their like again?

A lawyer without history or literature is a mechanic, a mere working mason; if he possesses some knowledge of these, he may venture to call himself an architect.

Lightly from fair to fair he flew, And loved to plead, lament, and sue; Suit lightly won, and short-lived pain, For monarchs seldom sigh in vain.

Spangling the wave with lights as vain As pleasures in the vale of pain, That dazzle as they fade.

In listening mood she seemed to stand, The guardian Naiad of the strand.

In the lost battle, Borne down by the flying, Where mingles war's rattle With groans of the dying.

Affection can withstand very severe storms of vigor, but not a long polar frost of indifference.

For Love will still be lord of all.

In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed; In war, he mounts the warrior's steed; In halls, in gay attire is seen; In hamlets, dances on the green. Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, And men below and saints above; For love is heaven, and heaven is love.

Her blue eyes sought the west afar, For lovers love the western star.

'T is an old tale and often told; But did my fate and wish agree, Ne'er had been read, in story old, Of maiden true betray'd for gold, That loved, or was avenged, like me.

I was not always a man of woe.

Then hush thee, my darling, take rest while you may, For strife comes with manhood, and waking with day.

... suspected to have more tongue in his head than mettle in his bosom.

I am she, O most bucolical juvenal, under whose charge are placed the milky mothers of the herd.

Where lives the man that has not tried How mirth can into folly glide, And folly into sin!

But with the morning cool reflection came.

A mother's pride, a father's joy.

When, musing on companions gone, We doubly feel ourselves alone.

Within that awful volume lies The mystery of mysteries!

My foot is on my native heath, and my name is MacGregor.

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne’er within him burn’d, As home his footsteps he hath turn’d From wandering on a foreign strand! If such there breathe, go mark him well; For him no Minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim; Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonor’d, and unsung.

Call it not vain: they do not err Who say that when the poet dies Mute Nature mourns her worshipper, And celebrates his obsequies.

It 's no fish ye 're buying, it 's men's lives.

November’s sky is chill and drear, November’s leaf is red and sear.

As old as the hills

But patience, cousin, and shuffle the cards Till our hand is a stronger one.

For ne’er was lost on poet’s ear: A simple race! They waste their toil For the vain tribute of a smile.

Respect was mingled with surprise, And the stern joy which warriors feel In foemen worthy of their steel.

The rose is fairest when 't is budding new, And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears. The rose is sweetest wash'd with morning dew, And love is loveliest when embalm'd in tears.

The rose is fairest when ‘tis budding new.

Rouse the lion from his lair.

Scared out of his seven senses.

Along thy wild and willow'd shore.

With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.

When Prussia hurried to the field, And snatch'd the spear, but left the shield.

Although too much of a soldier among sovereigns, no one could claim with better right to be a sovereign among soldiers.

Soldier rest! thy warfare o’er, Sleep the sleep thast knows not breaking, Dream of battled fields no more, Days of danger, nights of waking.

Steady of heart and stout of hand.

And the stern joy which warriors feel In foemen worthy of their steel.

No pale gradations quench his ray, No twilight dews his wrath allay.

The sun never sets on the immense empire of Charles V.

But woe awaits a country when She sees the tears of bearded men.

Tell that to the marines — the sailors won’t believe it.

Recollect that the Almighty, who gave the dog to be companion of our pleasures and our toils, hath invested him with a nature noble and incapable of deceit.

The playbill, which is said to have announced the tragedy of Hamlet, the character of the Prince of Denmark being left out.

The stag at eve had drunk his fill, Where danced the moon on Monam’s rill, And deep his midnight lair had made In lone Glenartney’s hazel shade.

Ah, County Guy, the hour is nigh, The sun has left the lea. The orange flower perfumes the bower, The breeze is on the sea.

Still are the thoughts to memory dear.

Time rolls his ceaseless course.

Who o'er the herd would wish to reign, Fantastic, fickle, fierce, and vain! Vain as the leaf upon the stream, And fickle as a changeful dream; Fantastic as a woman's mood, And fierce as Frenzy's fever'd blood. Thou many-headed monster thing, Oh who would wish to be thy king!

Jock, when ye hae naething else to do, ye may be aye sticking in a tree; it will be growing, Jock, when ye 're sleeping.

True love 's the gift which God has given To man alone beneath the heaven: It is not fantasy's hot fire, Whose wishes soon as granted fly; It liveth not in fierce desire, With dead desire it doth not die; It is the secret sympathy, The silver link, the silken tie, Which heart to heart and mind to mind In body and in soul can bind.

I cannot tell how the truth may be; I say the tale as ‘twas said to me.

To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored and unsung.

Vacant heart, and hand, and eye, Easy live and quiet die.

If thou would'st view fair Melrose aright, Go visit it by the pale moonlight.

So wags the world.

Widowed wife and wedded maid.

The will to do, the soul to dare.

Woman's faith and woman's trust, Write the characters in dust.

O!, many a shaft at random sent Finds mark the archer little meant! And many a word at random spoken May soothe, or wound, a heart that 's broken!

So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war, There never was knight like young Lochinvar.

Ridicule, the weapon of all others most feared by enthusiasts of every description, and which from its predominance over such minds, often checks what is absurd, and fully as often smothers that which is noble.

To the timid and hesitating everything is impossible because it seems so.

He turn'd his charger as he spake, Upon the river shore, He gave his bridle reins a shake, Said, 'Adieu for evermore, my love, And adieu for evermore.'

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