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dog quotes

  • It is just as full of propaganda as a dog is full of fleas. In fact, I say it's all fleas and no dog.

    - Dean Gooderham Acheson
    Of Russian Foreign Minister Andre Vishinsky's proposal that the US should withdraw from postwar Europe. Quoted in  James B Reston Deadline (1991).

  • Cave canem! Beware of the dog!

    -Anonymous
    Famous expression, found in mosaics and inscriptions in Pompeii and other Roman towns. See also Petronius Satyricon, 29.1:  Ad sinistram enim intrantibus non longe ab ostiarii cella canis ingens, catena vinctus, in pariete erat pictus superque quadrata littera scriptum cave canem (For on the left hand as you went in, not far from the porter's office, a great dog on a chain was painted on the wall, and over him was written in large letters:'Beware of the dog'. Translation by W H D Rouse).

  • If you are not the lead dog, the view never changes.

    -Anonymous
    Paperweight on the desk of Richard Scott, chief executive officer, Hospital Corp of  America. Quoted in Forbes,10 Oct1994.

  • Il y aura toujours un chien perdu quelque part qui m'empe"  chera d'e"  tre heureux. There will always be a lost dog somewhere that will prevent me being happy.

    -Jean Anouilh
      La Sauvage, act 3.

  • Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone, Silence the pianos and with muffled drum Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

    -W(ystan) H(ugh) Auden
      'Stop all the clocks', Collected Poems. Featured in the1994 film Four Weddings and a Funeral.

  • Diabetus. Ligate pancreatic ducts of dog. Keep dogs alive till acini degenerate leaving Islets. Try to isolate the internal secretion of these to relieve glycosuria.

    - Frederick Grant Banting
      Note scribbled in his journal, 2.00am, 31Oct. This led to the discovery of insulin for the treatment of diabetes, as recorded in Michael Bliss The Discovery of Insulin (1982).

  • And the Philistine said unto David, Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves?

    -Bible (Old Testament)
    Samuel17:43.

  • As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.

    -Bible (Old Testament)
    Proverbs 26:11.

  • For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog isbetter thana dead lion.For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.

    -Bible (Old Testament)
    Ecclesiastes 9:4^5.

  • The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.

    -Bible (NewTestament)
    Peter 2:22.

  • When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, that is news.

    -John B Bogart
    Quoted in F M O'Brien The Story of the Sun (1918), ch.10. The phrase is often attributed to Charles  A Dana.

  • They go to and fro in the evening: they grin like a dog, and run about through the city.

    -Book of Common Prayer
    Psalm 59:6.

  • Love is a Dog from Hell.

    - Charles Bukowski
      Title of book.

  • They know on the Continent that European football without the English islike a hot dog without themustard.

    - Sir Bobby (Robert) Charlton
      Quoted in Peter Ball and Phil Shaw The Book of Football Quotations (1989). There was at the time a Europeanban inforce against English clubs.

  • Dog eat dog produces, inevitably, just one dog.

    - Mario Matthew Cuomo
      In the NewYork Times, 31 Dec.

  • The police dog of American fiction, except that his hatred isnottheresultof mere crabbednessbut of aneye that sees too deep for comfort.

    - Clifton Fadiman
    Of US writer Ring Lardner. Quoted in Scott Meredith George S Kaufman and His Friends (1974).

  • No dog can go as fast as the money you bet on him. Flanagan theirheads, nomatterhowcharming a blufftheymay put up.

    - Bud stage name of Robert Winthrop Flanagan
    Quoted in Colin  Jarman The Guinness Dictionary of Sports Quotations (1990). 1934  Tender is the Night, bk.3, ch.12. English  songwriting  team,  who  made  their  name  with  At  the Drop of a Hat (1956).

  • I would rather have a man dog then a women dog because they do not bear like women dogs, it is a hard case it is shoking.

    - Marjory Fleming
      'Journal 2' in F Sidgwick (ed)  The Complete Marjory Fleming (1934).

  • Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog walking on its hinder legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.

    - Samuel known as Dr Johnson Johnson
      Remark, 31  Jul. Quoted in  James Boswell The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), vol.1.

  • I would rather see the portrait of a dog that I know, than all the allegorical paintings they can show me in the world.

    - Samuel known as Dr Johnson Johnson
    Quoted in Mrs Piozzi  Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson (1786).

  • When all the world is young, lad, And all the trees are green; And every goose a swan, lad, And every lass a queen; Then hey for boot and horse, lad, And round the world away: Young blood must have its course, lad, And every dog his day.

    - Charles Kingsley
      Song. The Water Babies, ch.2.

  •    We know that the tail must wag the dog, for the horse is drawn by the cart; But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old: 'It's clever, but is it Art?'

    - (Joseph) Rudyard Kipling
      'The Conundrum of the Workshops'.

  • There is sorrow enough in the natural way From men and women to fill our day; But when we are certain of sorrow in store, Why do we always arrange for more? Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

    - (Joseph) Rudyard Kipling
      'The Power of the Dog'.

  • As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man There are only four things certain since Social Progress began: That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire, And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire.

    - (Joseph) Rudyard Kipling
      Rudyard Kipling's Verse,'The Gods of the Copybook Headings'.

  • It's been a hard day's night, And I've been working like a dog.

    -Paul
      'A Hard Day's Night'.

  • I had learned that if one cannot call a country to heel like a dog, neither can one dismiss the past with a smile in an easygushof feeling, saying: Icould not help it,Iamalsoa victim.

    - Doris May ne  e Tayler Lessing
    This was the Old Chief's Country,'The Old Chief Mshlanga'.

  • Let's gomuch as that dog goes, intently haphazard.

    - Denise Levertov
      Overland to the Islands,'Overland to the Islands'.

  • Who is able to paint the existence of a dog as Picasso paints the existence of a cubic shape?

    - Franz Marc
    Quoted in Briefe,  Aufzeichnungen und  Aphorismen (2 vols,1920), translated by Chipp in his Theories of Modern  Art (1968).

  • He that is a traveller must have the back of an ass to bear all, atonguelikethetail ofa dog toflatterall, themouthof a hog to eat all what is set before him, the ear of a merchant to hear all and say nothing; and if this be not the highest step of thraldom, there is no liberty or freedom.

    -Thomas Nashe
      The Unfortunate Traveller, or the Life of  Jack Wilton.

  • I am his Highness'dog at Kew; Pray, tell me sir, whose dog are you?

    - Alexander Pope
    'Epigram Engraved on the Collar of a Dog which I gave to His Royal Highness'.

  • Thou art a beaten dog beneath the hail, A swollen magpie in a fitful sun, Half black half white Nor knowst'ou wing from tail Pull down thy vanity.

    - Ezra Loomis Pound
      The Pisan Cantos, no.81.

  •    You ain't nothin' but a hound dog cryin'all the time. You ain't nothin' but a hound dog cryin'all the time. Well, you ain't never caught a rabbit and you ain't no friend of mine.

    - Elvis Aaron Presley
      'Hound Dog' (written byJerry Leiber and Mike Stoller).

  • Were I (who to my loss already am One of those strange prodigious creatures, Man) A spirit, free to choose for my own share What case of flesh and blood I'd choose to wear, I'd be a dog, a monkey, or a bear.

    -JohnWilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester
      'A SatyrAgainst Mankind', l.1^5 (published1679).

  • Look like a girl, act like a lady, think like a man and work like a dog.

    - Caroline K(lein)   d.1993 Simon
    Comment the year after her candidacy for Postmaster General was barred by federal officials who claimed the job was unsuited to a woman. Recalled on her death, in the NewYork Times, 30 Jul1993.

  • I've already had medical attentiona dog licked me when I was on the ground.

    -1st Viscount
      OnlyWhen I Laugh.

  • Beware of anything that promises freedom or enlightenmenttraps for eager and clever foolsa dog has a keener noseevery creature in a cave can justify himself. Three-fourths of philosophyand literature is the talk of people trying to convince themselves that they really like the cage they were tricked into entering.

    - Gary Sherman Snyder
      Earth House Hold,'Japan FirstTimeAround, 24: X'.

  • For us in Russia, communism is a dead dog, while, for many people in the West, it is still a living lion.

    - Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
      In the Listener,15 Feb.

  • He will hold thee, when his passion shall have spent its novel force, Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse.

    -Tennyson
      Poems,'Locksley Hall', l.49^50.

  • Like a dog, he hunts in dreams.

    -Tennyson
      Poems,'Locksley Hall', l.79.

  • Portrait of the Artist as aYoung Dog.

    - Dylan Marlais Thomas
      Title of book.

  • America is a large, friendly dog in a very small room. Every time it wags its tail, it knocks over a chair.

    - Arnold Joseph Toynbee
      Letter, 26 Oct.

  • It don't make no difference whether you do right or wrong, a person's conscience ain't got no sense, and just goes for him anyway.If I had a yaller dog that didn't know nomorethana person's conscience does Iwould poison him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person's insides, and yet ain't no good, nohow. Tom Sawyer he says the same.

    - Mark pseudonym of  Samuel Langhorne Clemens Twain
      TheAdventures of Huckleberry Finn, ch.33.

  • If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man. Twain The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The law's delay, and the quietus which his pangs might take, In the dead waste and middle of the night, when Churchyards yawn In customary suits of solemn black, But that the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveler returns, Breathes forth contagion on the world, And thus the native hue of resolution, like the poor cat i' the adage, Is sicklied o'er with care, And all the clouds that lowered o'er our housetops, With this regard their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. But soft you, the fair Ophelia: Ope not thy ponderous and marble jaws, But get thee to a nunnerygo! See Shakespeare 753:74.

    - Mark pseudonym of  Samuel Langhorne Clemens Twain
      Pudd'nheadWilson, ch.16. 1884  The Duke's version of Hamlet's soliloquy, combining elements of other speeches by Hamlet and pieces of Macbeth. TheAdventures of Huckleberry Finn, ch.21.

  • I cannot bring myself to vote for a woman who has been voice-trained to speak to me as though my dog has just died.

    - Keith Spencer Waterhouse
      On MargaretThatcher, attributed.

  • To make a start, out of particulars and make them general, rolling up the sum, by defective means Sniffing the trees, just another dog among a lot of dogs.What else is there? And to do?

    -William Carlos Williams
      Paterson, bk.1, preface.

  • You say, as I have often given tongue In praise of what another's said or sung, 'Twere politic to do the like by these; But was there ever dog that praised his fleas?

    -W(illiam) B(utler) Yeats
      'To a Poet, who would have me Praise certain Bad Poets, Imitators of His and Mine', complete poem. Collected in The Green Helmet and Other Poems (1910).

Webster's New World Dictionary of Quotations Copyright © 2010 by Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Published by Wiley, Hoboken, NJ. Used by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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