Pedro Calderon de la Barca Quotes

Pedro Calderon de la Barca writes with a thoughtful, lyrical voice, inviting you to explore life, philosophy and suffering.

33 quotes

1. Estas que fueron pompa y alegria despertando al albor de la manana, a la tarde seran lastima vana durmiendo en brazos de la noche fria.

2. ?Que es la vida? Un frenesi. ?Que es la vida? Una ilusion, una sombra, una ficcion, y el mayor bien es pequeno; que toda la vida es sueno, y los suenos, suenos son.

3. Mas, sea verdad o sueno, obrar bien es lo que importa. Si fuere verdad, por serlo; si no, por ganar amigos para cuando despertemos.

4. El traidor no es menester siendo la traicion pasada.

5. ?Que os espanta, si fue mi maestro un sueno, y estoy temiendo, en mis ansias, que he de despertar y hallarme otra vez en mi cerrada prision? Y cuando no sea, el sonarlo solo basta; pues asi llegue a saber que toda la dicha humana, en fin, pasa como sueno.

6. Pues el delito mayor Del hombre es haber nacido.

7. Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises.

8. Love that is not madness is not love.

9. One may know how to gain a victory, and know not how to use it.

10. 'Tis not where we lie, but whence we fell; The loss of heaven's the greatest pain in hell.

11. What law, what reason can deny that gift so sweet, so natural that God has given a stream, a fish, a beast, a bird?

12. For even in dreams a good deed is not lost.

13. Speak no evil of women; I tell thee the meanest of them deserves respect; for of women do we not all come?

14. Love is all around you, love is there in you laughter, in your hair, love flows everywhere. Love is older than you but the light shining through makes me see your love is all new.

15. Even in dreams doing good is not wasted.

16. Grief has been compared to a hydra; for every one that dies, two are born.

17. Restless sunflower; cease to move.

18. The heart is an astrologer that always divines the truth.

19. All life is a dream, and all dreams are dreams.

20. No windows give a better view than those a man brings with him in his head, not asking for tickets of admission, since at all functions, festivals, or feasts he looks out with the same nice self-composure.

21. No virtue can be real that has not been tried. The gold in the crucible alone is perfect; the loadstone tests the steel, and the diamond is tried by the diamond, while metals gleam the brighter in the furnace.

22. Never confide your secrets to paper; it is like throwing a stone in the air; and if you know who throws the stone, you do not know where it may fall.

23. All just laws condemn cruelty.

24. All must yield to the weight of years; conquest is not difficult for time.

25. For man's greatest crime is to have been born.

26. For all life is a dream, and dreams themselves are only dreams.

27. These flowers, which were splendid and sprightly, waking in the dawn of the morning, in the evening will be a pitiful frivolity, sleeping in the cold night's arms.

28. The dower of great beauty has always been misfortune, since happiness and beauty do not agree together.

29. What is life? A madness. What is life? An illusion, a shadow, a story. And the greatest good is little enough; for all life is a dream, and dreams themselves are only dreams.

30. If a pretty woman only knew how anger improved her beauty! Her complexion needs no other paint than indignation.

31. The fox is very cunning, but he is more cunning who catches the fox.

32. A woman needs a stronger head than her own for counsel--she should marry.

33. Our treasures trifles seem, and all our life is dreaming, and the dreams themselves are dreams.