pearl quotes

Even if heaven were real, and measured as Revelation says, so many cubits this wayand that, how gimcrack a place it would be, crammed with its pavements of gold, its gates of pearl and topaz, like a gigantic chunkof costume jewelry.

- Margaret Laurence
  The Stone Angel, ch.4.

A god is not so glorious as a king. I think the pleasure they enjoy in Heaven, Cannot compare with kingly joys in earth. To wear a crown enchased with pearl and gold, Whose virtues carry with it life and death; To ask and have, command and be obeyed; When looks breed love, with looks to gain the prize, Such power attractive shines in princes'eyes!

- Christopher Marlowe
  Tamburlaine the Great (published1590), pt.1, act 2, sc.5.

I'll have them fly to India for gold, Ransack the ocean for orient pearl. 552

- Christopher Marlowe
c.1592  Doctor Faustus (published1604), act1, sc.1.

How am I glutted with conceit of this! Shall I make spirits fetch me what I please, Resolve me of all ambiguities, Perform what desperate enterprise I will? I'll have them fly to India for gold, Ransack the ocean for orient pearl, And search all corners of the new found world For pleasant fruits and princely delicates.

- Christopher Marlowe
c.1592  Doctor Faustus (published1604), act1, sc.1.

And as she wept, her tears to pearl he turned, And wound them on his arm, and for her mourned.

- Christopher Marlowe
   The mourner is Cupid. Hero and Leander (published1598), pt.1, l.375^6.

No oyster ever profited from its pearl.

-James Grover Thurber
  Fables for OurTime,'The Philosopher and the Oyster'.

It isno more easy to make a good picture than it isto find a diamond or a pearl. It means trouble and you risk your life for it.

-Vincent van Gogh
  From a letter to his brotherTheo, early Oct.