John (dramatist) Ford Quotes

John Ford weaves grand, poetic musings on love, ambition and the fleeting nature of glory for readers who love dramatic philosophy.

59 quotes

1. Her words are trusty heralds to her mind.

2. Oh, happy kings, Whose thrones are raised in their subjects' hearts.

3. Sister, look ye, How, by a new creation of my tailor's I've shook off old mortality.

4. A bachelor May thrive by observation, on a little. A single life's no burden: but to draw In yokes is chargeable, and will require A double maintenance.

5. Flattery Is monstrous in a true friend.

6. Physicians are the cobblers, rather the botchers, of men's bodies; as the one patches our tattered clothes, so the other solders our diseased flesh.

7. Tell us, pray, what devil This melancholy is, which can transform Men into monsters.

8. Melancholy Is not, as you conceive, indisposition Of body, but the mind's disease.

9. Philosophers dwell in the moon.

10. Love is the tyrant of the heart; it darkens Reason, confounds discretion; deaf to Counsel It runs a headlong course to desperate madness.

11. Fly hence, shadows, that do keep, Watchful sorrows, charmed in sleep.

12. Tempt not the stars, young man, thou canst not play With the severity of fate.

13. I am, gay creature, With pardon of your deities, a mushroom On whom the dew of heaven drops now and then.

14. Green indiscretion, flattery of greatness, Rawness of judgement, wilfulness in folly, Thoughts vagrant as the wind, and as uncertain.

15. The joys of marriage are the heaven on earth, Life's paradise, great princess, the soul's quiet, Sinews of concord, earthly immortality, Eternity of pleasures; no restoratives Like to a constant woman!

16. Glories Of human greatness are but pleasing dreams, And shadows soon decaying.

17. Revenge proves its own executioner.

18. There's not a hair Sticks on my head but, like a leaden plummet, It sinks me to the grave: I must creep thither; The journey is not long.

19. Truth is child of time.

20. Love is dead; let lovers' eyes Locked in endless dreams Th' extreme of all extremes Ope no more, for now Love dies.

21. He hath shook hands with time.

22. Nice philosophy May tolerate unlikely arguments, But heaven admits no jest.

23. I have spent Many a silent night in sighs and groans, Ran over all my thoughts, despised my fate, Reasoned against the reasons of my love, Done all that smoothed-cheek Virtue could advise, But found all bootless: 'tis my destiny That you must either love, or I must die.

24. Brother, even by my mother's dust, I charge you, Do not betray me to your mirth or hate.

25. Delay in vengeance gives a heavier blow.

26. There is a place, List, daughter! in a black and hollow vault, Where day is never seen; there shines no sun, But flaming horror of consuming fires; A lightless sulphur, choked with smoky fogs Of an infected darkness; in this place Dwell many thousand thousand sundry sorts Of never-dying deaths.

27. Busy opinion is an idle fool.

28. Why, I hold fate Clasped in my fist, and could command the course Of time's eternal motion, hadst thou been One thought more steady than an ebbing sea.

29. He is a noble gentleman; withal Happy in his endeavours: the general voice Sounds him for courtesy, behaviour, language, And every fair demeanour, an example: Titles of honour add not to his worth; Who is himself an honour to his title.

30. Let them fear bondage who are slaves to fear; The sweetest freedom is an honest heart.

31. We can drink till all look blue.

32. Ford was of the first order of poets. He sought for sublimity, not by parcels in metaphors or visible images, but directly where she has her full residence in the heart of man; in the actions and sufferings of the greatest minds.

33. Ford is rather a sculptor of character than a painter.

34. Revenge proves it's own executioner.

35. Anybody can direct a picture once they know the fundamentals. Directing is not a mystery, it's not an art. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.

36. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.

37. It is easier to get an actor to be a cowboy than to get a cowboy to be an actor.

38. Delay in vengeance delivers a heavier blow.

39. What is done, is done: Spend not the time in tears, but seek for justice.

40. Tis as manlike to bear extremities as godlike to forgive.

41. They are the silent griefs which cut the heart-strings.

42. You can speak well if your tongue can deliver the message of your heart.

43. I like, as a director and a spectator, simple, direct, frank films. Nothing disgusts me more than snobbism, mannerism, technical gratuity... and, most of all, intellectualism.

44. Revenge proves itself to be its own executioner.

45. When in doubt, make a western.

46. Honour, How much we fight with weakness to preserve thee!

47. Whilst we strive To live most free, we're caught in our own toils.

48. Not only does God play dice with the universe, He's using loaded dice.

49. How did I get to Hollywood? By train.

50. Love is a tyrant, resisted.

51. I love making pictures but I don't like talking about them.

52. Who better than an Irishman can understand the Indians, while still being stirred by tales of the US cavalry?

53. I didn't show up at the ceremony to collect any of my first three Oscars. Once I went fishing, another time there was a war on, and on another occasion, I remember, I was suddenly taken drunk.

54. To be quite blunt, I make pictures for money, to pay the rent.There are some great artists in the business. I am not one of them.

55. Contentment gives a crown, where fortune hath denied it.

56. Titles of honor add not to his worth, who is himself an honor of his titles.

57. Electronics is clearly the winner of the day.

58. “Lost, I am Lost! My fates have doomed my death. The more I strive, I love; the more I love, The less I hope. I see my ruin, certain. What judgement or endeavors could apply To my incurable and restless wounds I throughly have examined, but in vain. Oh, that it were not in religion sin To make our love a god and worship it! I have even wearied heaven with prayers, dried up The spring of my continual tears, even starved My veins with daily fasts; what wit or art Could counsel, I have practiced. But, alas, I find all these but dreams and old men's tales To fright unsteady youth; I'm still the same. Or I must speak or burst. Tis not, I know, My lust, but tis my fate that leads me on. Keep fear and low fainthearted shame with slaves! I'll tell her that I love her, through my heart Were rated at the price of that attempt.”

59. “Alas, poor gentleman, He look’d not like the ruins of his youth But like the ruins of those ruins.”