Women

"A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment."

"Still I can’t contradict, what so oft has been said, 'Though women are angels, yet wedlock's the devil.'"

"And whether coldness, pride, or virtue dignify A woman, so she's good, what does it signify?"

"What a strange thing is man! and what a stranger Is woman! What a whirlwind is her head, And what a whirlpool full of depth and danger Is all the rest about her."

"A lady of a 'certain age', which means Certainly aged."

"But she was a soft landscape of mild earth, Where all was harmony, and calm, and quiet, Luxuriant, budding; cheerful without mirth."

"I've seen your stormy seas and stormy women, And pity lovers rather more than seamen."

"I love the sex, and sometimes would reverse The tyrant's wish, "that mankind only had One neck, which he with one fell stroke might pierce;" My wish is quite as wide, but not so bad, And much more tender on the whole than fierce; It being (not now, but only while a lad) That womankind had but one rosy mouth, To kiss them all at once, from North to South."

"There is a tide in the affairs of women, Which, taken at the flood, leads—God knows where."

"A lady with her daughters or her nieces Shine like a guinea and seven-shilling pieces."

"In her first passion woman loves her lover, In all the others all she loves is love."

"Alas! the love of women! it is known To be a lovely and a fearful thing!"

"Sweet is revenge—especially to women."

"Her stature tall—I hate a dumpy woman."

"But—Oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual, Inform us truly, have they not hen-peck'd you all?"

"Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes, Soft as her clime, and sunny as her skies."

"She was his life, The ocean to the river of his thoughts, Which terminated all."

"Soft as the memory of buried love, Pure as the prayer which childhood wafts above."

"Believe a woman or an epitaph, Or any other thing that's false."

"The souls of women are so small, That some believe they've none at all; Or if they have, like cripples, still They've but one faculty, the will."

"I may not here omit those two main plagues, and common dotages of human kind, wine and women, which have infatuated and besotted myriads of people. They go commonly together."

"Women wear the breeches."

"It is a woman's reason to say I will do such a thing because I will."

"Their tricks and craft hae put me daft, They've ta'en me in, and a' that, But clear your decks, and—Here's the sex! I like the jads for a' that."

"Auld Nature swears, the lovely dears Her noblest work she classes, O: Her 'prentice hand she tried on man, An' then she made the lasses, O."

"Thy daughters bright thy walks adorn, Gay as the gilded summer sky, Sweet as the dewy milk-white thorn, Dear as the raptured thrill of joy."

"All the pleasing illusions ... are to be dissolved by this new conquering empire of 'light' and 'reason'. ... In this scheme of things, a king is only a man, a queen is only a woman; a woman is only an animal, and not an animal of the highest order. All homage paid to the female sex in general ... is to be regarded as romance and folly."

"A woman past forty should make up her mind to be young, not her face."

"Women are more powerful than they think. A mother's warmth is the essence of motivation. If we could liquefy the encouragement, care and compassion we deliver to our children it would surely fill an expanse greater than the Pacific."

"Of all cant in this most canting country, no species is at once more paltry and more dangerous than that which has been made the instrument of decrying female accomplishment. All that execrable twaddle about feminine retirement, and feminine ignorance, which we are doomed so often to hear, has done more towards making women scolds, and flirts, and scandal mongers, than people are well aware of. ... The soul of a woman is as fine an emanation from the Great Fountain of Spirit as that of a man."

"Charm...it’s a sort of bloom on a woman. If you have it, you don’t need to have anything else; and if you don’t have it, it doesn’t much matter what else you have. Some women, the few, have charm for all; and most have charm for one. But some have charm for none."

"Not she with trait'rous kiss her Saviour stung, Not she denied him with unholy tongue; She, while apostles shrank, could danger brave, Last at his cross, and earliest at his grave."

"Woman can equal man in loving strength: She shall surpass him, when her heart at length Quite flowers with fragrance fair. The man who brings her all the soul of Art Never quite wins her secret silent heart Unless his soul is there."

"O born to soothe distress and lighten care, Lively as soft, and innocent as fair! Blest with that sweet simplicity of thought So rarely found, and never to be taught; Of winning speech, endearing, artless, kind, The loveliest pattern of a female mind; Like some fair spirit from the realms of rest, With all her native heaven within her breast; So pure, so good, she scarce can guess at sin, But thinks the world without like that within; Such melting tenderness, so fond to bless, Her charity almost become excess. Wealth may be courted, Wisdom be revered, And Beauty praised, and brutal Strength be fear'd, But Goodness only can affection move, And love must owe its origin to love."

"To guard carefully her chastity; to control circumspectly her behavior; in every motion to exhibit modesty; and to model each act on the best usage, this is womanly virtue."

"Il n’y a que des enfants aimants et aimés qui puissent consoler une femme de la perte de sa beauté."

"Les vieilles filles n'ayant pas fait plier leur caractère et leur vie à une autre vie ni à d'autres caractères, comme l'exige la destinée de la femme, ont, pour la plupart, la manie de vouloir tout faire plier autour d'elles."

"La physionomie des femmes ne commence qu'à trente ans."

"Les femmes tiennent et doivent toutes tenir à être honorées, car sans l'estime elles n'existent plus. Aussi est-ce le premier sentiment qu'elles demandent à l'amour."

"La sainteté des femmes est inconciliable avec les devoirs et les libertés du monde. Emanciper les femmes, c'est les corrompre."

"Muliebre ingenium, prolubium, occasio."

"They're always abusing the women, As a terrible plague to men: They say we're the root of all evil, And repeat it again and again; Of war and quarrels and bloodshed, All mischief, be what it may: And pray, then, why do you marry us, If we're all the plagues you say? And why do you take such care of us, And keep us so safe at home, And are never easy a moment, If ever we chance to roam? When you ought to be thanking heaven That your Plague is out of the way— You all keep fussing and fretting— "Where is my Plague today?" If a Plague peeps out of the window, Up go the eyes of the men; If she hides then they all keep staring Until she looks out again."

"These impossible women! How they do get around us! The poet was right: Can’t live with them, or without them!"

": My heart is hot within me, Calonice, And sore I grieve for sake of womankind, Because the men account us all to be Sly, shifty rogues, : And so, by Zeus, we are."

"τῇ μὲν ὕδωρ ἐφόρει δολοφρονέουσα χειρί, τἠτέρῃ δὲ πῦρ."

"Οὐκ ἂν μύροισι γραῦς ἐοῦσ᾿ ἠλείφεο."

"You can never be kind to a woman with impunity."

"Of all the girls that e'er was seen, There's none so fine as Nelly."

"Senile illud facinus."

"I do not demand equal pay for any women save those who do equal work in value. Scorn to be coddled by your employers; make them understand that you are in their service as workers, not as women."