"When we know all of whatever it may be, we can never do anything but forgive, madame. That is the profoundest religious truth that was ever written. It contains, in fact, a whole religion—the noblest religion any man could have to guide him."

"Cette petite composition qui est, hélas, le dernier péché mortel de ma vieillesse."

"Bon Dieu; la voilà terminée, cette pauvre petite messe. Est-ce bien de la musique sacrée que je viens de faire, ou bien de la sacré musique ? J'étais né pour l'opera buffa, tu le sais bien! Peu de science, un peu de coeur, tout est là. Sois donc béni et accorde-moi le Paradis."

"Datemi il conto della lavandaia e vi metterò in musica anche quello."

"Je le prends deux fois par semaine, Haydn quatre fois et Mozart tous les jours. Vous me direz, Beethoven est un colosse, qui vous donne souvent des coups de poing dans les côtes, tandisque Mozart est toujours adorable. C'est que lui a eu la chance d'aller très jeune en Italie à un époque, où l'on chantait encore bien."

"His moral deficiencies as an artist were quite extraordinary. When he found the natural superiority of his genius in conflict with the ignorance and frivolity of the public – and the musical ignorance and frivolity of the Venetians and Neapolitans can hardly be overstated – he surrendered without a struggle. Although he was so able a man that it was easier and pleasanter to him to do his work intelligently than to conventionalize it and write down to the popular taste, he never persevered in any innovation that was not well received."

"Rossini, divino Maestro, Helios von Italien, der du deine klingenden Strahlen über die Welt verbreitest!"

"Rossini, in music, is the genius of sheer animal spirits. It is a species as inferior to that of Mozart, as the cleverness of a smart boy is to that of a man of sentiment; but it is genius nevertheless."

"Music is a kind of harmonious language."

"Aspettate fino alla sera prima del giorno fissato per la rappresentazione. Nessuna cosa eccita più l'estro come la necessità, la presenza d'un copista, che aspetta il vostro lavoro e la ressa d'un impresario in angustie, che si strappa a ciocche i capelli. A tempo mio in Italia tutti gli impresari erano calvi a trent'anni."

"Melodia semplice e varietà nel ritmo."

"Monsieur Wagner a de beaux moments, mais de mauvais quart d'heures."

"Cuius sit vita indecoris mortem fugere turpem haut convenit."

"Muliebre ingenium, prolubium, occasio."

"Saepe ignavavit fortem ex spe expectatio."

"Accius was a writer of tragedies, and being once asked why he, whose dialogue was celebrated for its energy, did not engage in the practice at the bar, answered, because in his tragedies he could make his characters say what he pleased; but that at the bar he should have to contend with persons who would say anything but what he pleased."

"Immo enim vero corpus Priamo reddidi, Hectora abstuli."

"Is demum miser est, cuius nobilitas miserias nobilitat."

"Probis probatum potius quam multis fore."

"Sapimus animo, fruimur anima; sine animo anima est debilis."

"Laetum in Parnaso inter pinos tripudiantem in ciroulis in ludo atque taedis fulgere."

"Probae etsi in segetem sunt deteriorem datae fruges, tamen ipsae suapte natura enitent."

"... Vigilandum est semper; multae insidiae sunt bonis."

"Oderint dum metuant."

"Virtuti sis par, dispar fortunis patris."

"O you hard hearts, you cruel men of Rome, Knew you not Pompey? Many a time and oft Have you climb'd up to walls and battlements, To towers and windows, yea, to chimney-tops, Your infants in your arms, and there have sat The livelong day, with patient expectation, To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome: And when you saw his chariot but appear, Have you not made an universal shout, That Tiber trembled underneath her banks, To hear the replication of your sounds Made in her concave shores? And do you now put on your best attire? And do you now cull out a holiday? And do you now strew flowers in his way That comes in triumph over Pompey's blood? Be gone! Run to your houses, fall upon your knees, Pray to the gods to intermit the plague That needs must light on this ingratitude."

"To sail is necessary, to live is not."

"More people worship the rising than the setting sun."

"Stop quoting laws, we carry weapons!"

"And besides, he was what? 25? He couldn't stand for a Praetorship even if he wanted to. But like I say, I don't care. I'm fine with it. I'm happy for him. Hooray for Pompey. Pompey the Great."

"Great Pompey's shade complains that we are slow, And Scipio's ghost walks unavenged amongst us!"