Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616)

Quotes

• Our greatest foes, and whom we must chiefly combat, are within.

• Among the attributes of God, although they are all equal, mercy shines with even more brilliancy than justice.

• Man have to have friends even in hell.

• The bow cannot always stand bent, nor can human frailty subsist without some lawful recreation.

• The most difficult character in comedy is that of a fool, and he must be no simpleton who plays the part.

• Facts are the enemy of truth.

• Truth indeed rather alleviates than hurts, and will always bear up against falsehood, as oil does above water.

• Delay always breeds danger; and to protract a great design is often to ruin it.

• Anyone who does not know how to make the most of his luck has no right to complain if it passes by him.

• Never stand begging for that which you have the power to earn.

• Be brief, for no discourse can please when too long.

• Tell me what company you keep and I'll tell you what you are.

• Delay always breeds danger and to protract a great design is often to ruin it.

• Short sentences drawn from long experiences.

• A proverb is a short sentence based on long experience.

• Time ripens all things; no man is born wise.

• When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical may be madness. To surrender dreams, this may be madness. To seek treasures where there is only trash...Too much sanity may be madness, and maddest of all is to see life as it is and not as it should be.

• Everyone is as God has made him, and oftentimes a great deal worse.

• I say that good painters imitated nature; but that bad ones vomited it.