Famous quotes
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Said in the 1500s
“Who was ever sorrowful to behold the murderer of innocents brought to his end, or what man weepeth to see a just massacre done upon a tyrant, usurper, villain, and bloody personage?”
François de Belleforest (1530–1583) said by 1583 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One may very well ask the purveyors of this puerile propaganda that if the record of Islam in medieval India was so bright and blameless, where is the need for this daily ritual of whitewashing it. Hindu heroes like Chandragupta Maurya, Samudragupta, Harihar, Bukka, Maharana Pratap, and Shivaji, to name only a few of the notables, have never needed any face-lift.”
Maharana Pratap (1540–1597) said by 1597 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Cogliam d'Amor la rosa: amiamo or quando Esser si puote riamato amando.”
Torquato Tasso (1544–1595) said by 1595 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“fashion not yourselves to the world”
William Tyndale (1494–1536) said by 1536 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Therefore it seems to me that I am no longer of this world, since I can no longer do the work of the world like the others; indeed, every action of others that I see disturbs me, for I do not work as they do, nor as I myself used to do. I feel altogether estranged from earthly affairs, and from my own most of all”
Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510) said by 1510 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I want to be trusted, and will not bargain with my subjects.”
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1500–1558) first seen 1528 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (Charles to the ministers of Holland, 1531), Ch. 8. Champion of the Western World, 1528-31
“If honor were profitable, everybody would be honorable.”
Thomas More (1478–1535) said by 1535 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attributed in Lives That Made a Difference: An RSME Book for Schools (2011) by P. J. Clarke
“We can estimate very surely and truthfully that in the forty years that have passed, with the infernal actions of the Christians, there have been unjustly slain more than twelve million men, women, and children. In truth, I believe without trying to deceive myself that the number of the slain is more like fifty million.”
Bartolomé de las Casas (1484–1566) said by 1566 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In judging policies we should consider the results that have been achieved through them rather than the means by which they have been executed.”
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) said by 1527 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From an undated letter to Piero Soderini (translated here by Dr. Arthur Livingston), in The Living Thoughts of Machiavelli, by Count Carlo Sforza, published by Cassell, London (1942), p. 85
“Do not believe what I tell you here any more than if it were some tale of a tub.”
François Rabelais (1494–1553) said by 1553 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Also quoted by: Francis Rabelais
“Eftsoones they heard a most melodious sound.”
Edmund Spenser (1552–1599) said by 1599 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For if credence shuld be gyven to euery suche lewd person as wold affirme himself to haue reuelations from god what redyer wey were there to subuert al common we[l]thes and good orders in the worlde... As for the late lord of Cauntreburys seying vnto you that she had many greate visions, it ought to move you never a deale to gyve credence vnto her or her reuelations.”
Thomas Cromwell (1485–1540) first seen 1534 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Nicholas Shaxton on Elizabeth Barton (February 1534), quoted in Roger Bigelow Merriman, Life and Letters of Thomas Cromwell, Volume I: Life, Letters to 1535 (1902), pp. 375-376
“We should become angels and not devils, that’s why we have been created and born into the world. Therefore be and stick to what God has chosen you for.”
Paracelsus (1493–1541) said by 1541 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“... defend the faith, yea even the true faith of Christ, not dreams, not fables, not heresy, not papistical inventions, but the uncorrupted faith of God’s most holy word, ...”
Myles Coverdale (1488–1569) said by 1569 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I will say no more, than that I will act as I shall answer hereafter to God and to man.”
William the Silent (1533–1584) said by 1584 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: After his wedding ceremony, on marrying his second wife, who was a Lutheran, as quoted in William the Silent (1897) by Frederic Harrison, p. 32
“Now will I show myself to have more of the serpent than the dove; that is, more knave than fool.”
Christopher Marlowe (1564–1593) said by 1593 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To promote a woman to beare rule, superioritie, dominion or empire above any realme, nation, or citie, is repugnant to nature, contumelie to God, a thing most contrarious to his reveled will and approved ordinance, and finalie it is the subversion of good order, of all equitie and justice.”
John Knox (1514–1572) first seen 1558 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous regiment of women 1558 reprint New York: Da Capo Press, 1972, p.9 as quoted in "Gender Difference and Tudor Monarchy: The Significance of Queen Mary I", Judith Richar…
“Principio quoniam magni commercia coeli Numina concessere homini, cui carmina curae, Ipse Deum genitor divinam noluit artem Omnibus expositam vulgo, immeritisque patere: Atque ideo, turbam quo longe arceret inertem, Angustam esse viam voluit, paucisque licere.”
Marco Girolamo Vida (1480–1566) said by 1566 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What indeed is more beautiful than heaven, which of course contains all things of beauty.”
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543) said by 1543 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Introduction to Book 1, as quoted/translated by Edward Rosen, Nicholas Copernicus on the Revolutions (1978) ed. Jerzy Dobrzycki, Edward Rosen.
“Why come ye nat to court? To whyche court? To the kynges courte? Or to Hampton Court?”
John Skelton (1460–1529) said by 1529 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Lines 401–404, quoted in The Complete English Poems of John Skelton: Revised Edition, ed. John Scattergood (2015), p. 253
“Book One, Natural Magic”
Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (1486–1535) said by 1535 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The second necessity which obtains in India, if those who live there are to be good Christians, is that your highness should introduce the holy Inquisition [...]”
Francis Xavier (1506–1552) said by 1552 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Neill, Stephen. A History of Christianity in India. Cambridge University Press, 1984. quoted in : Bhaskar Kamble, The Imperishable Seed: How Hindu Mathematics Changed the World and why this History was Erased, Garuda Pr…
“O mnie Moskwa i będą wiedzieć Tatarowie I, różnego mieszkańcy świata, Anglikowie.”
Jan Kochanowski (1530–1584) said by 1584 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Odes, II, 24. Reported in George R. Noyes, "6. Jan Kochanowski", Stephen P. Mizwa (ed.) Great Men and Women of Poland (New York: Macmillan Co, 1942) p. 67
“Fatto il voto, gabbano il Santo.”
Stefano Guazzo (1530–1593) said by 1593 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 300.