Explore the most impactful and insightful quotes and sayings by Washington Irving, and enrich your perspective with the wisdom. Share these inspiring Washington Irving quotes pictures with your friends on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or your personal blogs, completely free. Here are the top 165 Washington Irving quotes for you to read and share.
Balt Van Tassel was an easy indulgent soul; he loved his daughter better even than his pipe, and, like a reasonable man and an excellent father, let her have her way in everything. -- Washington Irving
favorite spectre of Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman, who had been heard several times of late, patrolling the country; and, it was said, tethered his horse nightly among the graves in the churchyard. -- Washington Irving
Ducks and geese are foolish things, and must be looked after, but girls can take care of themselves. -- Washington Irving
No man is so methodical as a complete idler, and none so scrupulous in measuring out his time as he whose time is worth nothing. -- Washington Irving
There is a certain artificial polish, a commonplace vivacity acquired by perpetually mingling in the beau monde; which, in the commerce of world, supplies the place of natural suavity and good-humour, but is purchased at the expense of all original and sterling traits of character. -- Washington Irving
Honest good humor is the oil and wine of a merry meeting, and there is no jovial companionship equal to that where the jokes are rather small and laughter abundant. -- Washington Irving
Nothing impresses the mind with a deeper feeling of loneliness than to tread the silent and deserted scene of former throng and pageant. -- Washington Irving
Great minds have purpose, others have wishes. Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise above them. -- Washington Irving
Poetry had breathed over and sanctified the land. -- Washington Irving
Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, and lifts the sprit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. -- Washington Irving
A few amber clouds floated in the sky without a breath of air to move them. The horizon was of a fine golden tint, changing gradually into a pure apple-green, and from that into the deep blue of the mid-heaven. -- Washington Irving
I was always fond of visiting new scenes, and observing strange characters and manners. Even when a mere child I began my travels, and made many tours of discovery into foreign parts and unknown regions of my native city, to the frequent alarm of my parents, and the emolument of the town-crier. -- Washington Irving
The natural principle of war is to do the most harm to our enemy with the least harm to ourselves; and this of course is to be effected by stratagem. -- Washington Irving
Fortune, in fact, is a pestilent shrew, and, withal, an inexorable creditor; and though for a time she may be all smiles and courtesies, and indulge us in long credits, yet sooner or later she brings up her arrears with a vengeance, and washes out her scores with our tears. -- Washington Irving
He who thinks much says but little in proportion to his thoughts. He selects that language which will convey his ideas in the most explicit and direct manner. -- Washington Irving
It has also been the peculiar lot of our country to be visited by the worst kind of English travellers. -- Washington Irving
Thus it happens that your true dull minds are generally preferred for public employ, and especially promoted to city honors; your keen intellects, like razors, being considered too sharp for common service. I -- Washington Irving
A father may turn his back on his child, brothers and sisters may become inveterate enemies, husbands may desert their wives, wives their husbands. But a mother's love endures through all. -- Washington Irving
A tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is the only edged tool that grows keener with constant use. -- Washington Irving
Great minds have purposes, others have wishes. -- Washington Irving
There is a sacredness in tears....They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love. -- Washington Irving
Critics are a kind of freebooters in the republic of letters
who, like deer, goats and divers other graminivorous animals, gain subsistence by gorging upon buds and leaves of the young shrubs of the forest, thereby robbing them of their verdure, and retarding their progress to maturity. -- Washington Irving
Society is like a lawn, where every roughness is smoothed, every bramble eradicated, and where the eye is delighted by the smiling verdure of a velvet surface -- Washington Irving
No! no! My engagement is with no bride
the worms! the worms expect me! I am a dead man
I have been slain by robbers
my body lies at Wurtzburg
at midnight I am to be buried
the grave is waiting for me
I must keep my appointment! -- Washington Irving
There are certain half-dreaming moods of mind in which we naturally steal away from noise and glare, and seek some quiet haunt where we may indulge our reveries and build our air castles undisturbed. -- Washington Irving
How convenient it would be to many of our great men and great families of doubtful origin, could they have the privilege of the heroes of yore, who, whenever their origin was involved in
obscurity, modestly announced themselves descended from a god. -- Washington Irving
And if unhappy in her love, her heart is like some fortress that has been captured, and sacked, and abandoned, and left desolate ... -- Washington Irving
Over no nation does the press hold a more absolute control than over the people of America, for the universal education of the poorest classes makes every individual a reader. -- Washington Irving
The dullest observer must be sensible of the order and serenity prevalent in those households where the occasional exercise of a beautiful form of worship in the morning gives, as it were, the keynote to every temper for the day, and attunes every spirit to harmony. -- Washington Irving
The moan of the whip-poor-will from the hillside; the boding cry of the tree-toad, that harbinger of storm; the dreary hooting of the screechowl. -- Washington Irving
Thus, by divers little makeshifts, in that ingenious way which is commonly denominated "by hook and by crook," the worthy pedagogue got on tolerably enough, and was thought, by all who understood nothing of the labor of headwork, to have a wonderfully easy life of it. -- Washington Irving
[I]n the gloomy month of February ... The Deserts of Arabia are not more dreary and inhospitable than the streets of London at such a time ... -- Washington Irving
I have never found, in anything outside of the four walls of my study, an enjoyment equal to sitting at my writing desk with a clean page, a new theme, and a mind awake. -- Washington Irving
Jealous people poison their own banquet and then eat it -- Washington Irving
A woman is more considerate in affairs of love than a man; because love is more the study and business of her life. -- Washington Irving
There is nothing like the silence and loneliness of night to bring dark shadows over the brightest mind. -- Washington Irving
By a kind of fashionable discipline, the eye is taught to brighten, the lip to smile, and the whole countenance to emanate with the semblance of friendly welcome, while the bosom is unwarmed by a single spark of genuine kindness and good-will. -- Washington Irving
But what courage can withstand the ever-during and all-besetting terrors of a woman's tongue? -- Washington Irving
Others may write from the head, but he writes from the heart, and the heart will always understand him. -- Washington Irving
The scholar only knows how dear these silent, yet eloquent, companions of pure thoughts and innocent hours become in the season of adversity. When all that is worldly turns to dross around us, these only retain their steady value. -- Washington Irving
This, to a busy mind like his, was a truly deplorable situation; and had he not been a man of inflexible morals and regular habits, there would have been great danger of his taking to politics or drinking - both which pernicious vices we daily see men driven to by mere spleen and idleness. -- Washington Irving
It is worthy to note, that the early popularity of Washington was not the result of brilliant achievement nor signal success; on the contrary, it rose among trials and reverses, and may almost be said to have been the fruit of defeat. -- Washington Irving
No man knows what the wife of his bosom is until he has gone with her through the fiery trials of this world. -- Washington Irving
He who wins a thousand common hearts is entitled to some renown; but he who keeps undisputed sway over the heart of a coquette is indeed a hero. -- Washington Irving
There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse; as I have found in traveling in a stage coach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position and be bruised in a new place. -- Washington Irving
It's a fair wind that blew men to ale. -- Washington Irving
It's a dog eat dog world. But only if the second dog is more stupid than the first. -- Washington Irving
There is in every true woman's heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad daylight of prosperity; but which kindles up, and beams and blazes in the dark hour of adversity. -- Washington Irving
A kind heart is a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity freshen into smiles. -- Washington Irving
As the leaves of trees are said to absorb all noxious qualities of the air, and to breathe forth a purer atmosphere, so it seems to me as if they drew from us all sordid and angry passions, and breathed forth peace and philanthropy. -- Washington Irving
To occupy an inch of dusty shelf-to have the title of their works read now and then in a future age by some drowsy churchman or casual straggler, and in another age to be lost, even to remembrance. Such is the amount of boasted immortality. -- Washington Irving
Sometimes he spent hours together in the great libraries of Paris, those catacombs of departed authors, rummaging among their hoards of dusty and obsolete works in quest of food for his unhealthy appetite. He was, in a manner, a literary ghoul, feeding in the charnel-house of decayed literature. -- Washington Irving
Poetry is evidently a contagious complaint. -- Washington Irving
The very difference of character in marriage produces a harmonious combination. -- Washington Irving
Man passes away; his name perishes from record and recollection; his history is as a tale that is told, and his very monument becomes a ruin. -- Washington Irving
Perhaps there never was a monument more characteristic of an age and people than the Alhambra; a rugged fortress without, a voluptuous palace within; war frowning from its battlements; poetry breathing throughout the fairy architecture of its halls. -- Washington Irving
What earnest worker, with hand and brain for the benefit of his fellowmen, could desire a more pleasing recognition of his usefulness than the monument of a tree, ever growing, ever blooming, and ever bearing wholesome fruit? -- Washington Irving
For what is history, but ... huge libel on human nature, to which we industriously add page after page, volume after volume, as if we were holding up a monument to the honor, rather than the infamy of our species. -- Washington Irving
I consider a story merely as a frame on which to stretch my materials. -- Washington Irving
Wit, after all, is a mighty tart, pungent ingredient, and much too acid for some stomachs; but honest good humor is the oil and wine of a merry meeting. -- Washington Irving
Acting provides the fulfillment of never being fulfilled. You're never as good as you'd like to be. So there's always something to hope for. -- Washington Irving
The Englishman is too apt to neglect the present good in preparing against the possible evil. -- Washington Irving
The tie which links mother and child is of such pure and immaculate strength as to be never violated. -- Washington Irving
For my part, I love to give myself up to the illusion of poetry. A hero of fiction that never existed is just as valuable to me as a hero of history that existed a thousand years ago. -- Washington Irving
It was Shakespeare's notion that on this day birds begin to couple; hence probably arose the custom of sending fancy love-billets. -- Washington Irving
There is a majestic grandeur in tranquillity. -- Washington Irving
The land of literature is a fairy land to those who view it at a distance, but, like all other landscapes, the charm fades on a nearer approach, and the thorns and briars become visible. -- Washington Irving
How easy is it for one benevolent being to diffuse pleasure around him, and how truly is a kind heart a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity to freshen into smiles. -- Washington Irving
After a man passes 60 , his mischief is mainly in his head -- Washington Irving
Sweet is the memory of distant friends! Like the mellow rays of the departing sun, it falls tenderly, yet sadly, on the heart. -- Washington Irving
Angling is an amusement peculiarly adapted to the mild and cultivated scenery of England -- Washington Irving
Kindness in women, not their beauteous looks, shall win my love. -- Washington Irving
The literary world is made up of little confederacies, each looking upon its own members as the lights of the universe; and considering all others as mere transient meteors, doomed to soon fall and be forgotten, while its own luminaries are to shine steadily into immortality. -- Washington Irving
Christmas is the season for kindling the fire of hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart. -- Washington Irving
There is a sacredness in tears -- Washington Irving
When friends grow cold, and the converse of intimates languishes into vapid civility and commonplace, these only continue the unaltered countenance of happier days, and cheer us with that true friendship which never deceived hope, nor deserted sorrow. -- Washington Irving
The schoolmaster is generally a man of some importance in the female circle of a rural neighborhood, being considered a kind of idle, gentlemanlike personage, of vastly superior taste and accomplishments to the rough country swains, and, indeed, inferior in learning only to the parson. -- Washington Irving
Luxury spreads its ample board before their eyes; but they are excluded from the banquet. Plenty revels over the fields; but theyare starving in the midst of its abundance: the whole wilderness has blossomed into a garden; but they feel as reptiles that infest it. -- Washington Irving
A woman's whole life is a history of the affections. -- Washington Irving
There is an enduring tenderness in the love of a mother to a son that trancends all other affections of the heart -- Washington Irving
He is the true enchanter, whose spell operates, not upon the senses, but upon the imagination and the heart. -- Washington Irving
Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune; but great minds rise above them. -- Washington Irving
He who would greatly deserve must greatly dare. -- Washington Irving
There is no character in the comedy of human life more difficult to play well than that of an old bachelor. -- Washington Irving
Into the space of one little hour sins enough may be conjured up by evil tongues to blast the fame of a whole life of virtue. -- Washington Irving
It is but seldom that any one overt act produces hostilities between two nations; there exists, more commonly, a previous jealousy and ill will, a predisposition to take offense. -- Washington Irving
To look upon its grass grown yard, where the sunbeams seem to sleep so quietly, one would think that there at least the dead might rest in peace. -- Washington Irving
There are moments of mingled sorrow and tenderness, which hallow the caresses of affection. -- Washington Irving
It is not poverty so much as pretense that harasses a ruined man - the struggle between a proud mind and an empty purse - the keeping up of a hollow show that must soon come to an end. -- Washington Irving
The only happy author in this world is he who is below the care of reputation. -- Washington Irving
There is an emanation from the heart in genuine hospitality which cannot be described, but is immediately felt and puts the stranger at once at his ease. -- Washington Irving
There is nothing in this world so hard to get at as truth, and there is nothing in this world but truth that I care for. -- Washington Irving
Some minds seem almost to create themselves, springing up under every disadvantage and working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand obstacles. -- Washington Irving
Small minds are subdued by misfortunes, greater minds overcome them. -- Washington Irving
Age is a matter of feeling, not of years. -- Washington Irving
My object is merely to give the reader a general introduction into an abode where, if so disposed, he may linger and loiter with me day by day until we gradually become familiar with all its localities. -- Washington Irving
It is almost startling to hear this warning of departed time sounding among the tombs, and telling the lapse of the hour, which, like a billow, has rolled us onward towards the grave. -- Washington Irving
Surely happiness is reflective, like the light of heaven; and every countenance, bright with smiles, and glowing with innocent enjoyment, is a mirror transmitting to others the rays of a supreme and ever-shining benevolence. -- Washington Irving
One of the greatest and simplest tools for learning more and growing is doing more. -- Washington Irving
Who ever hears of fat men heading a riot, or herding together in turbulent mobs? No - no, your lean, hungry men who are continually worrying society, and setting the whole community by the ears. -- Washington Irving
There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland scenery that enters into the soul and delights and elevates it, and fills it with noble inclinations. -- Washington Irving
It lightens the stroke to draw near to Him who handles the rod. -- Washington Irving
The Indians with surprise found the mouldering trees of their forests suddenly teeming with ambrosial sweet; and nothing, I am told, can exceed the greedy relish with which they banquet for the first time upon this unbought luxury of the wilderness. -- Washington Irving
The oil and wine of merry meeting. -- Washington Irving
I profess not to know how women's hearts are wooed and won. To me they have always been matters of riddle and admiration. -- Washington Irving
Love is never lost. If not reciprocated, it will flow back and soften and purify the heart. -- Washington Irving
What is it to know a variety of languages, but merely to have a variety of sounds express the same idea? Original thought is ore of the mind; language is but the stamp and coinage by which it is put into circulation. -- Washington Irving
There is a healthful hardiness about real dignity that never dreads contact and communion with others however humble. -- Washington Irving
The almighty dollar, that great object of universal devotion throughout our land, seems to have no genuine devotees in these peculiar villages. -- Washington Irving
Marriage is the torment of one, the felicity of two, the strife and enmity of three. -- Washington Irving
Redundancy of language is never found with deep reflection. Verbiage may indicate observation, but not thinking. He who thinks much says but little in proportion to his thoughts. -- Washington Irving
One point is certain, that truth is one and immutable; until the jurors all agree, they cannot all be right. -- Washington Irving
An inexhaustible good nature is one of the most precious gifts of heaven, spreading itself like oil over the troubled sea of thought, and keeping the mind smooth and equable in the roughest weather. -- Washington Irving
Too young for woe, though not for tears. -- Washington Irving
The youthful freshness of a blameless heart. -- Washington Irving
The dance, like most dances after supper, was a merry one; some of the older folks joined in it, and the squire himself figured down several couple with a partner, with whom he affirmed he had danced at every Christmas for nearly half a century. -- Washington Irving
How idle a boast, after all, is the immortality of a name! Time is ever silently turning over his pages; we are too much engrossed by the story of the present to think of the character and anecdotes that gave interest to the past; and each age is a volume thrown aside and forgotten. -- Washington Irving
A woman's life is a history of the affections. -- Washington Irving
The easiest thing to do, whenever you fail, is to put yourself down by blaming your lack of ability for your misfortunes. -- Washington Irving
He who would study nature in its wildness and variety, must plunge into the forest, must explore the glen, must stem the torrent, and dare the precipice. -- Washington Irving
Speculation is the romance of trade, and casts contempt upon on all its sober realities. It renders the stock-jobber a magician, and the exchange a region of enchantment. -- Washington Irving
Those who are well assured of their own standing are least apt to trepass on that of others. -- Washington Irving
To one given to day-dreaming, and fond of losing himself in reveries, a sea-voyage is full of subjects for meditation; but then they are the wonders of the deep and of the air, and rather tend to abstract the mind from worldly themes. -- Washington Irving
The natural effect of sorrow over the dead is to refine and elevate the mind. -- Washington Irving
After all, it is the divinity within that makes the divinity without; and I have been more fascinated by a woman of talent and intelligence, though deficient in personal charms, than I have been by the most regular beauty. -- Washington Irving
Christmas is here, Merry old Christmas, Gift-bearing Christmas, Day of grand memories, King of the year! -- Washington Irving
With every exertion, the best of men can do but a moderate amount of good; but it seems in the power of the most contemptible individual to do incalculable mischief. -- Washington Irving
There is a remembrance of the dead, to which we turn even from the charms of the living. These we would not exchange for the song of pleasure or the bursts of revelry. -- Washington Irving
Every antique farm-house and moss-grown cottage is a picture. -- Washington Irving
History fades into fable; fact becomes clouded with doubt and controversy; the inscription molders from the tablet; the statue falls from the pedestal. Columns, arches, pyramids, what are they but heaps of sand - and their epitaphs, but characters written in the dust? -- Washington Irving
I value this delicious home-feeling as one of the choicest gifts a parent can bestow. -- Washington Irving
The idol of today pushes the hero of yesterday out of our recollection; and will, in turn, be supplanted by his successor of tomorrow. -- Washington Irving
The love of a mother is never exhausted. It never changes - it never tires - it endures through all; in good repute, in bad repute. In the face of the world's condemnation, a mother's love still lives on. -- Washington Irving
Enthusiasts soon understand each other. -- Washington Irving
True love will not brook reserve; it feels undervalued and outraged, when even the sorrows of those it loves are concealed from it. -- Washington Irving
Knowledge is power, and truth is knowledge; whoever, therefore, knowingly propagates a prejudice, wilfully saps the foundation of his country's strength. -- Washington Irving
I sometimes think one of the great blessings we shall enjoy in heaven, will be to receive letters by every post and never be obliged to reply to them. -- Washington Irving
Language gradually varies, and with it fade away the writings of authors who have flourished their allotted time; otherwise, the creative powers of genius would overstock the world, and the mind would be completely bewildered in the endless mazes of literature. -- Washington Irving
The slanders of the pen pierce to the heart; they rankle longest in the noblest spirits; they dwell ever present in the mind and render it morbidly sensitive to the most trifling collision. -- Washington Irving
Every desire bears its death in its very gratification. Curiosity languishes under repeated stimulants, and novelties cease to excite and surprise, until at length we cannot wonder even at a miracle. -- Washington Irving
The tongue is the only tool that gets sharper with use. -- Washington Irving
The tongue is the only instrument that gets sharper with use. -- Washington Irving
Rising genius always shoots out its rays from among the clouds, but these will gradually roll away and disappear as it ascends to its steady luster. -- Washington Irving
I've had it with you and your emotional constipation! -- Washington Irving
Villainy wears many masks; none so dangerous as the mask of virtue. -- Washington Irving
The paternal hearth, the rallying-place of the affections. -- Washington Irving
Connecticut, a State which supplies the Union with pioneers for the mind as well as for the forest, -- Washington Irving
Roast beef and plum pudding are also held in superstitious veneration, and port and sherry maintain their grounds as the only true English wines; all others being considered vile, outlandish beverages. -- Washington Irving
I have often wondered at the extreme fecundity of the press, and how it comes to pass that so many heads on which nature seemed to have inflicted the curse of barrenness should teem with voluminous productions. -- Washington Irving
Those men are most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad, who are under the discipline of shrews at home. -- Washington Irving
somehow or other, there is a genial sunshine about you that warms every creeping thing into heart and confidence. Your -- Washington Irving
Men are always doomed to be duped, not so much by the arts of the other as by their own imagination. They are always wooing goddesses, and marrying mere mortals. -- Washington Irving
I have often had occasion to remark the fortitude with which women sustain the most overwhelming reverses of fortunes. -- Washington Irving
He that drinks beer, thinks beer. -- Washington Irving
There is never jealousy where there is not strong regard. -- Washington Irving
There was one species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that was petticoat government. -- Washington Irving
Young lawyers attend the courts, not because they have business there, but because they have no business. -- Washington Irving
I am always at a loss at how much to believe of my own stories. -- Washington Irving
They are given to all kinds of marvellous beliefs; are subject to trances and visions; and frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air. -- Washington Irving
Believe me, the man who earns his bread by the sweat of his brow, eats oftener a sweeter morsel, however coarse, than he who procures it by the labor of his brains. -- Washington Irving
Washington, in fact, had very little private life, but was eminently a public character. -- Washington Irving
There is certainly something in angling that tends to produce a serenity of the mind. -- Washington Irving
History is but a kind of Newgate calendar, a register of the crimes and miseries that man has inflicted on his fellow-man. -- Washington Irving
They who drink beer will think beer. -- Washington Irving
Other men are known to posterity only through the medium of history, which is continually growing faint and obscure; but the intercourse between the author and his fellow-men is ever new,
active, and immediate. -- Washington Irving
