Shears Quotes
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Marriage resembles a pair of shears, so joined that they can not be separated; often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing anyone who comes between them.
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More Shears Quotes
Alas! What boots it with uncessant care To tend the homely slighted Shepherd's trade, And strictly meditate the thankless muse; Were it not better done as others use, To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th'abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life.
john milton— 1637 Lycidas, l.64-76.
Mydefinition of marriage? It resembles a pairof shears, so joined that theycannot be separated; often moving in opposite directions, yet always punishing anyone who comes between them.
Rev Sydney Smith— Quoted in Lady Holland Memoir (1855), vol.1, ch.11.
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise, (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th' abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life.
john milton— John Milton, Lycidas, line 70.
And sing to those that hold the vital shears; And turn the adamantine spindle round, On which the fate of gods and men is wound.
john milton— John Milton, Arcades.
Alas! what boots it with incessant care To tend the homely slighted shepherd's trade, And strictly meditate the thankless Muse? Were it not better done as others use, To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th' abhorrèd shears, And slits the thin-spun life.
john milton— Line 64. Compare: "Erant quibus appetentior famæ videretur, quando etiam sapientibus cupido gloriae novissima exuitur" (Translated: "Some might consider him as too fond of fame, for the desire of glory clings even to the best of men longer than any other passion"), Tacitus, Historiae, iv. 6; said of Helvidius Priscus.
Think you I bear the shears of destiny? Have I commandment on the pulse of life?
william shakespeare— William Shakespeare, King John (1598), Act IV, scene 2, line 91.
As I search the archives of my memory I seem to discern six types or methods which divide themselves from one another with measurable distinctness. There is the type magisterial or imperative; the type laconic or sententious; the type conversational or homely; the type refined or artificial, smelling of the lamp, verging at times upon preciosity or euphuism; the demonstrative or persuasive; and finally the type tonsorial or agglutinative, so called from the shears and the pastepot which are its implements and emblem.
benjamin n. cardozo— On types of judicial writing, in "Law and Literature" in Law and Literature and Other Essays and Addresses (1931), p. 10.
