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What's come to perfection perishes.
Things learned on earth we shall practise in heaven;
Works done least rapidly Art most cherishes.

— Robert Browning Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed (1919)

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More quotes by Robert Browning

The heavens and earth stay as they were; my heart
Beats as it beat: the truth remains the truth.

Colombe's Birthday (1844)

Let us cry, "All good things
Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul!"

Dramatis Personae (1864)

Inscribe all human effort with one word,
Artistry's haunting curse, the Incomplete!

The Ring and the Book (1868)

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what's a heaven for?

Men and Women (1855)

God is the perfect poet,
Who in his person acts his own creations.

Paracelsus (1835)

All Robert Browning quotes →

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Men accept servility in order to acquire wealth; as if they could acquire anything of their own when they cannot even assert that they belong to themselves.

Étienne de La Boétie Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1548)

The confusion of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.

George Bernard Shaw Man and Superman (1903)

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

C. S. Lewis God in the Dock (1970)

Affectation hides three times as many virtues as charity does sins.

Horace Mann Thoughts Selected from the Writings of Horace Mann (1867)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Robert Browning (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.