Introduction,
Lord Byron, born George Gordon Byron, was an English poet and politician who is considered one of the most important figures in the Romantic movement. He was born on January 22, 1788, in London, England, to a noble family with a long history of political and military service.
Byron’s early life was marked by tragedy, including the death of his father when he was just three years old and his mother’s subsequent abandonment of him. Despite these difficulties, Byron excelled academically and went on to study at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he gained a reputation for his wit, charm, and eccentricities.
Byron’s literary career began in earnest in 1812, with the publication of the first two cantos of his epic poem “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.” The poem, which was based on his own travels through Europe, was an immediate success and established Byron as a major literary figure.
Byron’s personal life was often as dramatic and scandalous as his writing. He had numerous affairs with both men and women, and his outspoken political views made him a controversial figure in his time. He died on April 19, 1824, at the age of 36, while fighting for Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire. Despite his short life, Byron’s impact on English literature and culture is still felt today, and his works continue to be celebrated for their lyricism, wit, and passion.
I have a heart – and faculties – which require exercise, and that exercise is indulgence in poetry, – and consequently, I have done – and am doing – what few can do – or, if they could, would not, – I have lived for posterity.
Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life.
The great art of life is sensation, to feel that we exist, even in pain.
Adversity is the first path to truth.
I am such a strange mixture of good and evil that it would be difficult to describe me.
I love not man the less, but Nature more.
If I am fool, it is, at least, a doubting one; and I envy no one the certainty of his self-approved wisdom.
Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.
The best prophet of the future is the past.
There is no instinct like that of the heart.
All who joy would win must share it. Happiness was born a twin.
I am a lover of humanity, a dreamer of improbable dreams, a champion of the underdog, and an enemy of injustice.
The most important thing is to be whatever you are without shame.
Man’s love is of man’s life a part; it is a woman’s whole existence.
The best way to become acquainted with a subject is to write a book about it.
He who is only just is cruel. Who on earth could live were all judged justly?
A great poet is the most precious jewel of a nation.
Fools are my theme, let satire be my song.
I have great faith in fools; self-confidence, my friends call it.
To withdraw myself from myself has ever been my sole, my entire, my sincere motive in scribbling at all.
And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ’tis that I may not weep.
I am never long, even in the society of her I love, without yearning for the company of my lamp and my library.
But words are things, and a small drop of ink, falling like dew upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think.
A thousand years may scare form a state. An hour may lay it in ruins.
Whoever makes a revolution only halfway digs his own grave.
The poetry of earth is never dead.
The good in this world far outweighs the bad. The problem is, the bad is more intense.
In solitude, where we are least alone.
Death, so called, is a thing which makes men weep, and yet a third of life is passed in sleep.
Friendship may, and often does, grow into love, but love never subsides into friendship.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.
There is something pagan in me that I cannot shake off. In short, I deny nothing, but doubt everything.
There is no instinct like that of the heart.
Friendship is Love without his wings!
There is pleasure in the pathless woods, there is rapture in the lonely shore, there is society where none intrudes, by the deep sea, and music in its roar; I love not Man the less, but Nature more.
Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.
Man’s love is of man’s life a part; it is a woman’s whole existence. In her first passion, a woman loves her lover, in all the others all she loves is love.
Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life. The evening beam that smiles the clouds away, and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray.
There are four questions of value in life, Don Octavio. What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for and what is worth dying for? The answer to each is the same. Only love.
Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life.
Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt In solitude, where we are least alone.
Always laugh when you can. It is cheap medicine.
Adversity is the first path to truth.
There is something pagan in me that I cannot shake off. In short, I deny nothing, but doubt everything.
All who joy would win must share it. Happiness was born a Twin.
The great art of life is sensation, to feel that we exist, even in pain.
The heart will break, but broken live on.
I love not man the less, but Nature more.
Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven!
Death, so called, is a thing which makes men weep, And yet a third of life is passed in sleep.
Yes, love indeed is light from heaven; A spark of that immortal fire with angels shared, by Allah given to lift from earth our low desire.
The busy have no time for tears.
Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; the best of life is but intoxication.
Roll on, deep and dark blue ocean, roll. Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain. Man marks the earth with ruin, but his control stops with the shore.
I only go out to get me a fresh appetite for being alone.
I know that two and two make four – and should be glad to prove it too if I could – though I must say if by any sort of process I could convert 2 and 2 into five it would give me much greater pleasure.
Like the measles, love is most dangerous when it comes late in life.
The best prophet of the future is the past.
