Physiognomy Quotes

• Their elegant shape, showy colors, and slow, sailing mode of flight, make them very attractive objects, and their numbers are so great that they form quite a feature in the physiognomy of the forest, compensating for the scarcity of flowers.

  Henry Walter Bates

  Inspirational, Funny, Flower

  Henry Walter Bates (1873). “The Naturalist on the River Amazons: A Record of Adventures, Habits of Animals, Sketches of Brazilian and Indian Life, and Aspects of Nature Under the Equator, During Eleven Years of Travel”, p.131

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• If we want to make a statement about a man's nature on the basis of his physiognomy, we must take everything into account; it is in his distress that a man is tested, for then his nature is revealed.

  Paracelsus

  Men, Want, Bases

  Paracelsus, George Rosen, Henry Ernest Sigerist, Clarice Lilian Temkin, Gregory Zilboorg (1941). “Four Treatises Together with Selected Writings”

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• People think how a sugar basin has no physiognomy, no soul. But it changes every day.

  Paul Cezanne

  Thinking, Artist, People

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• A strange and somewhat impassive physiognomy is often, perhaps, an advantage to an orator, or leader of any sort, because it helps to fix the eye and fascinate the mind.

  Charles Horton Cooley

  Eye, Leader, Mind

  Charles Horton Cooley (1992). “Human Nature and the Social Order”, p.347, Transaction Publishers

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• A wise man will find us to be rogues by our faces.

  Jonathan Swift

  Wise, Men, Rogues

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• There is nothing truer than physiognomy, taken in connection with manner.

  Charles Dickens

  Taken, Connections

  Charles Dickens (1861). “The Lamplighter's Story; Hunted Down; the Detective Police; and Other Nouvellettes”, p.21

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• Physiognomy is often a great falsifier, though as a rule it is honest enough.

  Joaquin Miller

  Honest, Enough

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• PHYSIOGNOMY, n. The art of determining the character of another by the resemblances and differences between his face and our own, which is the standard of excellence.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Art, Character, Differences

  Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.181, University of Georgia Press

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• The tongue is more easily controlled than the features of the face; and though the heart may be secret, the face is transparent.

  Helen Hunt

  Heart, Secret, May

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• We are all of us more or less active physiognomists.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Active

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• You're either sexy or you're not. I'm very self-conscious about my physiognomy.

  Bobby Darin

  Sexy, Self, Conscious

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• What knowledge is there of which man is capable that is not founded on the exterior,--the relation that exists between visible and invisible, the perceptible and the imperceptible?

  Johann Kaspar Lavater

  Men, Invisible, Relation

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• Nature never writes a blind hand.

  Thomas Starr King

  Writing, Hands, Blind

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• There are mystically in our faces certain characters which carry in them the motto of our souls, wherein he that cannot read may read our natures.

  Thomas Browne

  Life, Character, Soul

  Sir Thomas Browne (1844). “Religio Medici [and] Its Sequel Christian Morals”, p.102

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• Every passion gives a particular cast to the countenance, and is apt to discover itself in some feature or other. I have seen an eye curse for half an hour together, and an eyebrow call a man a scoundrel.

  Joseph Addison

  Passion, Eye, Men

  Joseph Addison, Sir Richard Steele (1826). “The Spectator: With Notes, and a General Index”, p.114

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• The language of the face is not taught by the schools; it is intuitive, and to the observant is always legible.

  Julia Ward Howe

  School, Faces, Taught

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• The scope of an intellect is not to be measured with a tape-string, or a character deciphered from the shape or length of a nose.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Character, Tape, Noses

  Christian Nestell Bovee (1862). “Intuitions and Summaries of Thought”, p.82

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• People's opinions of themselves are legible in their countenances.

  Jeremy Collier

  People, Opinion, Countenance

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• There is a certain physiognomy in manners.

  Joseph Cook

  Manners, Certain

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• It is believed that physiognomy is only a simple development of the features already marked out by nature. It is my opinion, however, that in addition to this development, the features come insensibly to be formed and assume their shape from the frequent and habitual expression of certain affections of the soul. These affections are marked on the countenance; nothing is more certain than this; and when they turn into habits, they must leave on it durable impressions.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Simple, Expression, Soul

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• These flattering mirrors reflect imperfectly what is within; the countenance is often a gay deceiver. What defects of mind lie hidden under its beauty! What fair exteriors conceal base souls!

  Pierre Corneille

  Lying, Gay, Mirrors

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• As the language of the face is universal, so 'tis very comprehensive; no laconism can reach it: 'Tis the short hand of the mind, and crowds a great deal in a little room

  Jeremy Collier

  Hands, Mind, Crowds

  Jeremy Collier (1969). “Essays Upon Several Moral Subjects: (1698-1709).”

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• Nothing in the world can be compared to the human face. It is a land one can never tire of exploring. There is no greater experience in a studio than to witness the expression of a sensitive face under the mysterious power of inspiration. To see it animated from inside, and turning into poetry.

  Carl Theodor Dreyer

  Inspiration, Expression, Land

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• Physiognomy is not a guide that has been given us by which to judge of the character of men: it may only serve us for conjecture.
  [Fr., La physionomie n'est pas une regle qui nous soit donnee pour juger des hommes; elle nous peut servir de conjecture.]

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Character, Men, Judging

  "Les Caractères", XII, as quoted in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 97-106,

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• There is no Champollion to decipher the Egypt of every man's and every being's face. Physiognomy, like every other human science,is but a passing fable.

  Herman Melville

  Character, Men, Egypt

  Herman Melville (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Herman Melville (Illustrated)”, p.2096, Delphi Classics

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