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The Canterbury Tales

Geoffrey Chaucer

Top 10 Best Quotes

“people can die of mere imagination”

“If gold rusts, what then can iron do?”

“No empty handed man can lure a bird”

“Then you compared a woman's love to Hell, To barren land where water will not dwell, And you compared it to a quenchless fire, The more it burns the more is its desire To burn up everything that burnt can be. You say that just as worms destroy a tree A wife destroys her husband and contrives, As husbands know, the ruin of their lives. ”

“Purity in body and heart May please some--as for me, I make no boast. For, as you know, no master of a household Has all of his utensils made of gold; Some are wood, and yet they are of use.”

“Love will not be constrain'd by mastery. When mast'ry comes, the god of love anon Beateth his wings, and, farewell, he is gone. Love is a thing as any spirit free.”

“Youth may outrun the old, but not outwit.”

“Yet do not miss the moral, my good men. For Saint Paul says that all that’s written well Is written down some useful truth to tell. Then take the wheat and let the chaff lie still.”

“Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote The droghte of March hath perced to the roote, And bathed every veyne in switch licour Of which vertu engendred is the flour; Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth Inspired hath in every holt and heeth The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne Hath in the Ram his half cours yronne, And smale foweles maken melodye, That slepen al the nyght with open ye (So Priketh hem Nature in hir corages), Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes, To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes; And specially from every shires ende Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende, The hooly blisful martir for to seke, That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke”

“And high above, depicted in a tower, Sat Conquest, robed in majesty and power, Under a sword that swung above his head, Sharp-edged and hanging by a subtle thread.”

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Book Keywords:

rust, chaucer, canterbury-tales, fallibility, love, flaws, open-mind, wisdom, gold, relationships, inspirational, imperfection, iron, learning-the-truth

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