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Ambition: Quotations from Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations
But an old age serene and bright, And lovely as a Lapland night, Shall lead thee to thy grave.— WORDSWORTH — To a Young Lady.
The monumental pomp of age Was with this goodly Personage; A stature undepressed in size, Unbent, which rather seemed to rise In open victory o'er the weight Of seventy years, to loftier height.— WORDSWORTH — The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto III
Thus fares it still in our decay, And yet the wiser mind Mourns less for what age takes away Than what it leaves behind.— WORDSWORTH — The Fountain. St. 9.
To take a soldier without ambition is to pull off his spurs.— BACON — Essays. Of Ambition.
No man is born without ambitious worldly desires.— CARLYLE — Essays. Schiller.
The noblest spirit is most strongly attracted by the love of glory.— CICERO
I've reared a monument alone More durable than brass or stone; Whose cloudy summit is more hid Than regal height of pyramid.— ABRAHAM COLES — Memorial Tributes: P. 130. Trans. of Horace. Lib.
III. Car. XXX. I had a soul above buttons. S. GEORGE COLMAN (the Younger)-Sylvester Daggerwood, or New Hay at the Old Market. Sc. 1. By low ambition and the thirst of praise.— COWPER — Table Talk. L. 591.
On the summit see, The seals of office glitter in his eyes; He climbs, he pants, he grasps them! At his heels, Close at his heels, a demagogue ascends, And with a dexterous jerk soon twists him down, And wins them, but to lose them in his turn.— COWPER — Task. Bk. IV. L. 58.
But wild Ambition loves to slide, not stand, And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land.— DRYDEN- — Absalom and Achitophel. Pt. I. L. 198.
They please, are pleas'd, they give to get esteem Till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.— GOLDSMITH — The Traveller. L. 266.
For all may have, If they dare try, a glorious life, or grave. C.— HERBERT — The Temple. The
Church-Porch. Unmoved though Witlings sneer and Rivals rail; Studious to please, yet not ashamed to fail.— SAM'L JOHNSON — Prologue to Tragedy of
Irene. I see, but cannot reach, the height That lies forever in the light.— LONGFELLOW — Christus. The Golden Legend. Pt. II. A Village Church.
Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.— LONGFELLOW — Drift-Wood. Table-Talk.
Ambition has no rest!— BULWER-LYTTON — Richelieu. Act III. Sc. 1.
The man who seeks one thing in life, and but one, May hope to achieve it before life be done; But he who seeks all things, wherever he goes, Only reaps from the hopes which around him he sows A harvest of barren regrets. OWEN MEREDITH (Lord Lytton)- Lucile. Pt. I. Canto II. St. 8. Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.— MILTON — Paradise Lost. Bk. I. L. 263.
But what will not ambition and revenge Descend to? who aspires must down as low As high he soar'd, obnoxious first or last To basest things.— MILTON — Paradise Lost. Bk. IX. L. 168.
Here may we reign secure, and in my choice To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell.— MILTON — Paradise Lost. Bk. I. L. 261.
If at great things thou would'st arrive, Get riches first, get wealth, and treasure heap, Not difficult, if thou hearken to me; Riches are mine, fortune is in my hand, They whom I favor thrive in wealth amain, While virtue, valor, wisdom, sit in want.— MILTON — Paradise Regained. Bk. II. L. 426.
Such joy ambition finds.— MILTON — Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 92.
I'll make thee glorious by my pen, And famous by my sword. MARQUIS OF MONTROSE (Jas. Graham)- My Dear and Only Love. But see how oft ambition's aims are cross'd, And chiefs contend 'til all the prize is lost!— POPE — Rape of the Lock. Canto V. L. 108.
Men would be angels, angels would be gods.— POPE — Essay on Man. Ep. I. L. 126.
Oh, sons of earth! attempt ye still to rise, By mountains pil'd on mountains to the skies? Heav'n still with laughter the vain toil surveys, And buries madmen in the heaps they raise.— POPE — Essay on Man. Ep. IV. L. 74.
Who knows but He, whose hand the lightning forms, Who heaves old ocean, and who wings the storms, Pours fierce ambition in a Cæsar's mind.— POPE — Essay on Man. Ep. I. L. 157.
Be always displeased at what thou art, if thou desire to attain to what thou art not; for where thou hast pleased thyself, there thou abidest. S.— QUARLES — Emblems. Bk. IV.
Emblem 3. Ambition is no cure for love!— SCOTT — Lay of the Last Minstrel. Canto I. St. 27.
O fading honours of the dead! O high ambition, lowly laid!— SCOTT — Lay of the Last Minstrel. Canto II. St. 10.
Ambition's debt is paid. u. Julius Cæsar. Act III. Sc. 1. L. 83. I have no spur To prick the sides of my intent, but only Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself, And falls on the other.— Shakespeare — Macbeth. Act I. Sc. 7. L. 25.
Ill-weav'd ambition, how much art thou shrunk! When that this body did contain a spirit, A kingdom for it was too small a bound; But now, two paces of the vilest earth Is room enough.— Shakespeare — Henry IV. Pt. I. Act V. Sc. 4. L. 88.
Mark but my fall, and that that ruin'd me. Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition. By that sin fell the angels; how can man then, The image of his Maker, hope to win by it?— Shakespeare — Henry VIII. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 437.
The noble Brutus Hath told you Cæsar was ambitious; If it were so, it was a grievous fault; And grievously hath Cæsar answered it. Julius Cæsar. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 75. The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act II. Sc. 2. L. 264.
'Tis a common proof, That lowliness is young ambition's ladder, Whereto the climber upward turns his face : But when he once attains the upmost round, He then unto the ladder turns his back, Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees By which he did ascend. Julius Cæsar. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 21. Virtue is chok'd with foul ambition.— Shakespeare — Henry VI. Pt. II. Act III. Sc. 1. Sc. 1. L. 143.
Ambition is our idol, on whose wings Great minds are carry'd only to extreme; To be sublimely great, or to be nothing.— THOS. SOUTHERNE — The Loyal Brother. Act I. Sc. 1.
And mad ambition trumpeteth to all.— WILLIS — From a Poem delivered at the
Departure of the Senior Class of Yale College (1827). How like a mounting devil in the heart Rules the unreined ambition!— WILLIS — Parrhasius.
Ambition has but one reward for all : A little power, a little transient fame, A grave to rest in, and a fading name!— WILLIAM WINTER — The Queen's Domain. L. 90.
Talents angel-bright, If wanting worth are shining instruments In false ambition's hand, to finish faults Illustrious, and give infamy renown.— YOUNG — Night Thoughts. Night VI. L. 276.
Too low they build who build beneath the beneath the stars.— YOUNG — Night Thoughts.
Night VIII. L.
Prima enim sequentem, honestum est in secundis, tertiisque consistere. When you are aspiring to the highest place, it is honorable to reach the second or even the third rank.— CICERO — De Oratore. I.
Nil mortalibus arduum est: Cœlum ipsum petimus stultitiâ. Nothing is too high for the daring of mortals: we would storm heaven itself in our folly.— HORACE — Carmina. I. 3. 37.
Vestigia nulla retrorsum. No steps backward. C.— HORACE — Epistolæ. I. 1. 74.
Velle parum est; cupias ut re potiaris oportet; Et faciat somnos hæc tibi cura breves. To wish is of little account; to succeed you must earnestly desire; and this desire must shorten thy sleep.— OVID — Epistolæ Ex Ponto. III. 1. 35.
An erit, qui velle recuset Os populi meruisse? et cedro digna locutus Linquere, nec scombros metuentia carmina nec thus. Lives there the man with soul so dead as to disown the wish to merit the people's applause, and having uttered words worthy to be kept in cedar oil to latest times, to leave behind him rhymes that dread neither herrings nor frankincense.— PERSIUS — Satiræ. I. 41.
Licet ipsa vitium sit ambitio, frequenter tamen causa virtutum est. Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues.— QUINTILIAN — De Institutione Oratoria.
II. 22. Si vis ad summum progredi, ab infimo ordire. If you wish to reach the highest, begin at the lowest.— SYRUS — Maxims.