MISERY QUOTES III

quotations about misery

Misery travels free through the whole world!

FRIEDRICH SCHILLER

Wallenstein's Tod

Tags: Friedrich Schiller


We often see misery dwelling in the midst of splendor, whilst real happiness is found in humbler stations.

HERODOTUS

attributed, Day's Collacon


Perhaps it may be found more easy to forget those tempers we learnt in misery.

EDMUND LAW

attributed, Day's Collacon


Ah how shameless -- the way these mortals blame the gods. From us alone they say come all their miseries yes but they themselves with their own reckless ways compound their pains beyond their proper share.

HOMER

The Odyssey

Tags: Homer


I hate all pain,
Given or received; we have enough within us
The meanest vassal as the loftiest monarch,
Not to add to each other's natural burden
Of mortal misery.

LORD BYRON

Sardanapalus

Tags: Lord Byron


But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.

WILLIAM COWPER

The Castaway

Tags: William Cowper


Every misery that I miss is a new mercy.

IZAAK WALTON

The Complete Angler


Misery pulls away the brackets of life leaving you to free fall.

JEANETTE WINTERSON

Written on the Body

Tags: Jeanette Winterson


Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any misery, any depression, since after all you don't know what work these conditions are doing inside you? Why do you want to persecute yourself with the question of where all this is coming from and where it is going? Since you know, after all, that you are in the midst of transitions and you wished for nothing so much as to change. If there is anything unhealthy in your reactions, just bear in mind that sickness is the means by which an organism frees itself from what is alien; so one must simply help it to be sick, to have its whole sickness and to break out with it, since that is the way it gets better.

RAINER MARIA RILKE

Letters to a Young Poet

Tags: Rainer Maria Rilke


The wretched hasten to hear of their own miseries.

SENECA THE YOUNGER

Hercules Oetaeus

Tags: Seneca the Younger


Extreme hopes are born of extreme misery.

BERTRAND RUSSELL

Unpopular Essays

Tags: Bertrand Russell


All that was really there was still more misery -- oh yes! as much of that as you like.

EMILE ZOLA

Germinal

Tags: Emile Zola


Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay; but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none.

HERMAN MELVILLE

Bartleby, the Scrivener

Tags: Herman Melville


But O yet more miserable!
Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave.

JOHN MILTON

Samson Agonistes

Tags: John Milton


I would cling to unhappiness because it was a known, familiar state. When I was happier, it was because I knew I was on my way back to misery. I've never been convinced that happiness is the object of the game. I'm wary of happiness.

HUGH LAURIE

attributed, Inside Inside


Misery's fine -- as long as you know you can get out of it when you want to.

ARTHUR ADAMOV

Ping Pong

Tags: Arthur Adamov


There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.

VICTOR HUGO

Les Misérables

Tags: Victor Hugo


Life is not an easy matter.... You cannot live through it without falling into frustration and cynicism unless you have before you a great idea which raises you above personal misery, above weakness, above all kinds of perfidy and baseness.

LEON TROTSKY

Diary in Exile, 1935

Tags: Leon Trotsky


Nothing is miserable unless you think it so; and on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you are content with it.

BOETHIUS

The Consolation of Philosophy


Misery makes sport to mock itself.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Richard II

Tags: William Shakespeare