Vex Quotes - Page 2

• Vex not thy spirit at the course of things, they heed not thy vexations

  Marcus Aurelius

  Spirit, Courses, Heed

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• If we assiduously cultivate our powers of exaggeration, perhaps we, too, shall obtain the Paradise of Liars. And there Raphael shall paint for us scores and scores of his manifestly impossible pictures... and Shakespeare will lie to us of fabulous islands far past 'the still-vex'd Bermoothes,' and bring us fresh tales from the coast of Bohemia. For no one will speak the truth there, and we shall all be perfectly happy.

  James Branch Cabell

  Liars, Lying, Past

  "On Telling the Truth". William and Mary College Monthly, Volume VII (pp. 53-55), November 1897.

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• I have tried to answer the question which sent me to Samoa: Are the disturbances which vex our adolescents due to the nature of adolescence itself or to the civilization? Under different conditions does adolescence present a different picture?

  Margaret Mead

  Civilization, Doe, Different

  Margaret Mead (1971). “Coming of Age in Samoa”

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• Biography, too, is liable to the same objection; it should be autobiography. Let us not, as the Germans advise, endeavor to go abroad and vex our bowels that we may be somebody else to explain him. If I am not I, who will be?

  Henry David Thoreau

  May, Biographies, Endeavor

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.126, Courier Corporation

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• Requiescat Tread lightly, she is near Under the snow, Speak gently, she can hear The daisies grow. All her bright golden hair Tarnished with rust, She that was young and fair Fallen to dust. Lily-like, white as snow, She hardly knew She was a woman, so Sweetly she grew. Coffin-board, heavy stone, Lie on her breast, I vex my heart alone She is at rest. Peace, Peace, she cannot hear Lyre or sonnet, All my life’s buried here, Heap earth upon it.

  Oscar Wilde

  Lying, Heart, White

  Oscar Wilde, Russell Jackson, Ian Small (2000). “The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: Poems and poems in prose”, p.5, Oxford University Press on Demand

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• Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.

  Jane Austen

  Clever, Home, Blessing

  Jane Austen (2008). “Emma: By Jane Austen”, p.2, MobileReference

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• Lady, for indeed
  I loved you and I deemed you beautiful,
  I cannot brook to see your beauty marred
  Through evil spite: and if ye love me not,
  I cannot bear to dream you so forsworn:
  I had liefer ye were worthy of my love,
  Than to be loved again of you - farewell;
  And though ye kill my hope, not yet my love,
  Vex not yourself: ye will not see me more.

  Alfred Lord Tennyson

  Life, Beautiful, Dream

  Alfred, Lord Tennyson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (Illustrated)”, p.1133, Delphi Classics

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• We sometimes fear to bring our troubles to God, because they must seem small to Him who sitteth on the circle of the earth. But if they are large enough to vex and endanger our welfare, they are large enough to touch His heart of love. For love does not measure by a merchant's scales, not with a surveyor's chain. It hath a delicacy... unknown in any handling of material substance.

  R. A. Torrey

  Fear, Heart, Circles

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• We are born to lose and to perish, to hope and to fear, to vex ourselves and others; and there is no antidote against a common calamity but virtue; for the foundation of true joy is in the conscience.

  Seneca the Younger

  True Joy, Foundation, Common

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• If you put on more garments, the cold cannot reach you. Similarly, increase your patience and concentration and even great injuries cannot vex your mind.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Wisdom, Mind, Cold

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• The rain set early in tonight, The sullen wind was soon awake, It tore the elm-tops down for spite, And did its best to vex the lake: I listened with heart fit to break. When glided in Porphyria; straight She shut the cold out and the storm, And kneeled and made the cheerless grate Blaze up and all the cottage warm.

  Robert Browning

  Rain, Heart, Lakes

  Robert Browning (1994). “The Works of Robert Browning”, p.358, Wordsworth Editions

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• Not so in haste, my heart! Have faith in God and wait; Although he linger long, He never comes too late. He never comes too late, He knoweth what is best: Vex not thyself in vain; Until he cometh, rest. Until he cometh, rest. Nor grudge the hours that roll: The feet that wait for God Are soonest at the goal. Are soonest at the goal. That is not gained by speed; Then hold thee still, my heart, For I shall wait his lead.

  Bradford Torrey

  Heart, Feet, Long

  Bradford Torrey, “Not So In Haste, My Heart”

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• I'll walk where my own nature would be leading:
  It vexes me to choose another guide:
  Where the grey flocks in ferny glens are feeding;
  Where the wild wind blows on the mountain-side.

  Emily Bronte

  Country, Blow, Wind

  Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte, Anne Bronte (2014). “Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell”, p.211, The Floating Press

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• I read it [history] a little as a duty, but it tells me nothing that does not either vex or weary me. The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars or pestilences, in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all — it is very tiresome: and yet I often think it odd that it should be so dull, for a great deal of it must be invention.

  Jane Austen

  Kings, War, Men

  Jane Austen (1833). “Northanger abbey [followed by] Persuasion”, p.87

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• Daphne knows, with equal ease, How to vex and how to please; But the folly of her sex Makes her sole delight to vex.

  Jonathan Swift

  Sex, Anger, Delight

  Jonathan Swift (1803). “The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, D.D. ... : with Notes, Historical and Critical”, p.187

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• He was met even now As mad as the vex'd sea; singing aloud; Crown'd with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds, With bur-docks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers, Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow In our sustaining corn.

  William Shakespeare

  Weed, Flower, Sea

  William Shakespeare (1866). “The Works of William Shakespeare”, p.376

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• It vexes me greatly that having to earn my living has forced me to interrupt the work and to attend to small matters.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Matter

  Leonardo Da Vinci “The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci”, Lulu.com

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• I said it in Hebrew—I said it in Dutch— I said it in German and Greek; But I wholly forgot (and it vexes me much) That English is what you speak!

  Lewis Carroll

  Greek, Dutch, Hebrew

  Lewis Carroll “Alice in Wonderland”, W. W. Norton & Company

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• The chief secret of comfort lies in not suffering trifles to vex us, and in prudently cultivating our undergrowth of small pleasures, since very few great ones, alas! are let on long leases.

  Richard Sharp

  Lying, Long, Secret

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• As small letters hurt the sight, so do small matters him that is too much intent upon them; they vex and stir up anger, which begets an evil habit in him in reference to greater affairs.

  Plutarch

  Hurt, Sight, Evil

  Plutarch (1704). “Plutarch's Morals”, p.58

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• The fear of God is freedom, joy, and peace;
  And makes all ills that vex us here to cease.

  Edmund Waller

  Fear, Joy, Cease

  Edmund Waller (1854). “Poetical Works of Edmund Waller. Edited by Robert Bell”, p.244

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• Doing a straight-forward, clear-cut task that has a beginning and an end balances out the complexity-without-end that often vexes the rest of my life. Sacred simplicity.

  Robert Fulghum

  Life, Work, Cutting

  Robert Fulghum (2004). “All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten: Uncommon Thoughts on Common Things”, p.57, Ballantine Books

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• What vexes me most is, that my female friends, who could bear me very well a dozen years ago, have now forsaken me, although I am not so old in proportion to them as I formerly was: which I can prove by arithmetic, for then I was double their age, which now I am not. Letter to Alexander Pope. 7 Feb. 1736.

  Jonathan Swift

  Friendship, Years, Age

  Jonathan Swift, Thomas Roscoe (1843). “The Works of Jonathan Swift ...: Containing Interesting and Valuable Papers, Not Hitherto Published ... With Memoir of the Author”, p.764

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• From the midst of the very fountain of pleasure, something of bitterness arises to vex us in the flower of enjoyment.

  Lucretius

  Flower, Bitterness, Pleasure

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• A zeal for different opinions concerning religion...[has] divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good.

  James Madison

  Party, Religion, Atheism

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1864). “The Federalist: A Commentary on the Constitution of the United States”, p.106

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