Giovanni Boccaccio Quotes

Do as we say, and not as we do

Heaven would indeed be heaven if lovers were there permitted as much enjoyment as they had experienced on earth.

My mind is wholly possessed by Love, who rules every part there of, in virtue of his all-embracing deity.

Kissed mouth don't lose its fortune, on the contrary it renews itself just as the moon does.

In the affairs of this world, poverty alone is without envy.

You must read, you must persevere, you must sit up nights, you must inquire, and exert the utmost power of your mind. If one way does not lead to the desired meaning, take another; if obstacles arise, then still another; until, if your strength holds out, you will find that clear which at first looked dark.

People tend to believe the bad rather than the good.

Nothing is so indecent that it cannot be said to another person if the proper words are used to convey it.

In this world, you only get what you grab for.

Fiammetta, whose wavy tresses fell in a flood of gold over her white and delicate shoulders

Let this grisly beginning be none other to you than is to wayfarers a rugged and steep mountain.

And the plague gathered strength as it was transmitted from the sick to the healthy through normal intercourse, just as fire catches on to any dry or greasy object placed too close to it. Nor did it stop there: not only did the healthy incur the disease and with it the prevailing mortality by talking to or keeping company with the sick--they had only to touch the clothing or anything else that had come into contact with or been used by the sick and the plague evidently was passed to the one who handled those things.

Although love dwells in gorgeous palaces, and sumptuous apartments, more willingly than in miserable and desolate cottages, it cannot be denied but that he sometimes causes his power to be felt in the gloomy recesses of forests, among the most bleak and rugged mountains, and in the dreary caves of a desert.

No-thing less splendid than a golden sepulchre would have suited so noble a heart.

Human it is to have compassion on the unhappy

So long she held on in this mourning manner, that, what by the
continuall watering of the Basile, and putrifaction of the head, so
buried in the pot of earth; it grew very flourishing, and most
odorifferous to such as scented it, that as no other Basile could
possibly yeeld so sweete a savour.