Top 500 J. R. R. Tolkien Quotes (2025 Update)
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351. “Hail the victorious dead!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

352. “Few there were who could change his courses by counsel. None by force.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

353. “You cannot pass!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

354. “If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be secret to keep them so.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

355. “Much evil must befall a country before it ever really forgets the Elves, if once they lived there.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

356. “There is no curse in Elvish, Entish, or the tongues of Men for this treachery.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

357. “Old Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow, Bright blue his jacket is, and his boots are yellow. None has ever caught him yet, for Tom, he is the Master: His songs are stronger songs, and his feet are faster.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

358. “When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

359. “Go not to the Elves for counsel, for they will say both no and yes.’ ‘Is it indeed?’ laughed Gildor. ‘Elves seldom give unguarded advice, for advice is a dangerous gift, even from the wise to the wise, and all courses may run ill.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

360. “He loved mountains, or he had loved the thought of them marching on the edge of stories brought from far away; but now he was borne down by the insupportable weight of Middle-earth. He longed to shut out the immensity in a quiet room by a fire.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

361. “Go back?” he thought. “No good at all! Go sideways? Impossible! Go forward? Only thing to do! On we go!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

362. “Go back to the abyss! Fall into nothingness that awaits you and your master!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

363. “I wish I was at home in my nice hole by the fire, with the kettle just beginning to sing!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

364. “This is a story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

365. “There was a most specially greedy, strong and wicked worm called Smaug.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

366. “Few other griefs amid the ill chances of this world have more bitterness and shame for a man’s heart than to behold the love of a lady so fair and brave that cannot be returned.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

367. “And what would you do, if an uninvited dwarf came and hung his things up in your hall without a word of explanation?”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

368. “We are plain quiet folk, and I have no use for adventures. Nasty, disturbing, and uncomfortable things.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

369. “No taste of food, no feel of water, no sound of wind, no memory of tree or grass or flower, no image of moon or star are left to me. I am naked in the dark, Sam, and there is no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I begin to see it even with my waking eyes, and all else fades.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

370. “My armor is like tenfold shields, my teeth are swords, my claws spears, the shock of my tail a thunderbolt, my wings a hurricane, and my breath death!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

371. “Now at this last we must take a hard road, a road unforeseen. There lies our hope, if hope it be. To walk into peril – to Mordor. We must send the Ring to the Fire.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

372. “And yet, Eomer, I say to you that she loves you more truly than me, for you she loves and knows; but in me she loves only a shadow and a thought: a hope of glory and great deeds, and lands far from the fields of Rohan. – Aragorn to Eomer, of Eowyn.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

373. “But the enemy has the move, and he is about to open his full game. And pawns are as likely to see as much of it as any. Sharpen your blade!”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

374. “The Dark Lord has Nine. But we have One, mightier than they: the White Rider. He has passed through the fire and the abyss, and they shall fear him. We will go where he leads.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

375. “For of us is required a blind trust, and a hope without assurance, knowing not what lies before us in a little while.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

376. “Better mistrust undeserved than rash words.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

377. “Thus came Aragorn son of Arathorn, Elessar, Isildur’s heir, out of the Paths of the Dead, borne upon a wind from the sea to the kingdom of Gondor.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

378. “Elvish singing is not a thing to miss, in June under the stars, not if you care for such things.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

379. “Faerie is a perilous land, and in it are pitfalls for the unwary, and dungeons for the overbold.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

380. “I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament...”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

381. “I give you this toast: To the Hobbits. May they outlast the Sarumans and see spring again in the trees.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

382. “A few melancholy birds were pipping and wailing, until the round red sun sank slowly into the western shadows; then an empty silence fell.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

383. “Yet seldom do they fail of their seed, And that will lie in the dust and rot to spring up again in times and places unlooked-for. The deeds of Men will outlast us.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

384. “American English is essentially English after having been wiped off with a dirty sponge.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

385. “Don’t tell us about dreams – dream dinners aren’t any good and we can’t share them.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

386. “The world was fair, the mountains tall In Elder Days before the fall...”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

387. “And if Sam considered himself lucky, Frodo knew he was more lucky himself; for there was not a hobbit in the Shire that was looked after with such care.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

388. “Lazy Lob and crazy Cob are weaving webs to wind me. I am far more sweet than other meat, but still they cannot find me! Here am I, naughty little fly; you are fat and lazy. You cannot trap me, though you try, in your cobwebs crazy.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

389. “Orcs, and talking trees, and leagues of grass, and galloping riders, and glittering caves, and white towers and golden halls, and battles, and tall ships sailing, all these passed before Sam’s mind.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

390. “O! Tril-lil-lil-lolly the valley is jolly, ha! ha! -Elves of Rivendell.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

391. “As she stood before Aragorn she paused suddenly and looked upon him, and her eyes were shining. And he looked down upon her fair face and smiled; but as he took the cup, his hand met hers, and he knew that she trembled at the touch.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

392. “And he smote the Balrog upon the mountainside.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

393. “Their horses were of great stature, strong and clean-limbed; their gray coats glistened, their long tails flowed in the wind, their manes were braided on their proud necks.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

394. “There is little or no magic about them, except the ordinary everyday sort which helps them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like you and me come blundering along, making a noise like elephants which they can hear a mile off.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

395. “And there was Frodo, pale and worn, and yet himself again; and in his eyes there was peace now, neither strain of will, nor madness, nor any fear. His burden was taken away.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

396. “It was dark and dim all day. From the sunless dawn until evening the heavy shadow had deepened, and all hearts in the City were oppressed. Far above a great cloud streamed slowly westward from the Black Land, devouring light, borne upon a wind of war; but below the air was still and breathless, as if all the Vale of Anduin waited for the onset of a ruinous storm.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

397. “Where iss it, where iss it: my Precious, my Precious? It’s ours, it is, and we wants it.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

398. “I’m going on an adventure.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

399. “Travellers scowl at us, and countrymen give us scornful names. ‘Strider’ I am to one fat man who lives within a day’s march of foes that would freeze his heart, or lay his little town in ruin, if he were not guarded ceaselessly. Yet we would not have it otherwise. If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be secret to keep them so.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien

400. “Memory is not what the heart desires. That is only a mirror, be it clear as Kheled-zaram. Or so says the heart of Gimli the Dwarf.”

— J. R. R. Tolkien