Top 70 Matthew Gregory Lewis Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “As yet his other passions lay dormant; But they only needed to be once awakened, to display themselves with violence as great and irresistible.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

2. “An author, whether good or bad, or between both, is an animal whom every body is privileged to attack: for though all are not able to write books, all conceive themselves able to judge them.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

3. “While in each other’s arms entranced They lay, They blessed the night, and curst the coming day. Lee.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

4. “Antonia’s heart was so filled with admiration for the Monk, that She eagerly seized the opportunity of speaking of him: Besides, as She now no longer considered Lorenzo as an absolute Stranger, She was less embarrassed by her excessive timidity. ‘Oh! He far exceeds all my expectations,’ answered.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

5. “Man was born for society. However little He may be attached to the World, He never can wholly forget it, or bear to be wholly forgotten by it.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

6. “Vice is ever most dangerous when lurking behind the Mask of Virtue.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

7. “In my veins while blood shall roll, Thou art mine! I am thine! Thine my body! Thine my soul!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

8. “Great Heaven! How frail thy creature Man is made! How by himself insensibly betrayed! In.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

9. “I have no Friend in the world, and from the restlessness of my destiny I never can acquire one. Fain.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

10. “Away with friendship! ’tis a cold unfeeling word. My bosom burns with love, with unutterable love, and love must be its return.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

11. “A serious dignity reigned upon her countenance, but was tempered by a grace and sweetness which rendered her truly enchanting. Lorenzo.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

12. “Nor must it be forgotten that the author is a man of rank and fortune. – Yes! the author of the Monk signs himself a LEGISLATOR! – We stare and tremble.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

13. “Artless yourself, you suspect not others of deceit; and viewing the world through the medium of your own truth and innocence, you fancy all who surround you to deserve your confidence and esteem. What pity, that these gay visions must soon be dissipated! What pity, that you must soon discover the baseness of mankind, and guard against your fellow-creatures as against your Foes!′ ‘Alas!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

14. “Her alarm was ungrounded. None sleep so profoundly, as those who are determined not to wake. The.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

15. “The critic Thomas-James Mathias, for instance, compared The Monk with John Cleland’s Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure – ‘Another Cleland.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

16. “Ambrosio is neither a mechanistic eroticist, nor a promiscuous Sadeian fornicator; rather, he is an obsessive fantasist who serially fixates on the unattainable in order to define his own sense of self. And.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

17. “Lewis read Udolpho within days of it appearing, and there was much in the novel he would have found ‘interesting’: a persecuted and captive heroine, an implacable villain, mysterious infatuation and abduction, strange music, convents and Catholicism, robber gangs, hallucinatory occurrences and ghostly tales, a dark and claustrophobic castle, hidden corpses and the brooding omnipresence of death and murder, veiled figures, and secret passages and suffocating darkness. But.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

18. “That destruction o’er you hovers; Lustful Man and crafty Devil Will combine to work your evil; And from earth by sorrows driven, Soon your Soul must speed to heaven.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

19. “Were it possible’ said the Friar, ’for Man to be so totally wrapped up in himself as to live in absolute seclusion from human nature, and could yet feel the contented tranquillity which these lines express, I allow that the situation would be more desirable, than to live in a world so pregnant with every vice and every folly. But.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

20. “She had torn open her habit, and her bosom was half exposed. The weapon’s point rested upon her left breast: And Oh! that was such a breast! The Moonbeams darting full upon it enabled the Monk to observe its dazzling whiteness. His eye dwelt with insatiable avidity upon the beauteous Orb.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

21. “They had felt the sharpest darts in misfortune’s quiver; Those which remained appeared blunt in comparison.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

22. “He blushed to see his Countrymen the Dupes of deceptions so ridiculous, and only wished for an opportunity to free them from their monkish fetters.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

23. “Though still unconscious how extensive was its influence, He dreaded the melodious seduction of her voice.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

24. “It is not the Woman’s beauty that fills me with such enthusiasm; It is the Painter’s skill that I admire, it is the Divinity that I adore! Are not the passions dead in my bosom? Have.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

25. “Preserve me from becoming the Victim of Remorse! Your heart has already felt the anguish of hopeless love; Oh! then if you really value me, spare mine that anguish!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

26. “This hoary head again thy yoke shall bear: Remembering that my fairest years By Thee were marked with sighs and tears, I think thy friendship false, and shun the guileful snare.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

27. “Ambrosio, learn to know me better. I love you for your virtues: Lose them, and with them you lose my affections. I look upon you as a Saint; Prove to me that you are no more than Man, and I quit you with disgust.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

28. “Lost is the time which is not past in love.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

29. “You! whom Vanity’s light bark conveys On Fame’s mad voyage by the wind of praise, With what a shifting gale your course you ply, For ever sunk too low, or borne too high! Who pants for glory finds but short repose, A breath revives him, and a breath o’er-throws.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

30. “Could I look like Thee with disgust upon Mankind, could bury myself for ever in some impenetrable solitude, and forget that the world holds Beings deserving to be loved! Oh God! What a blessing would Misanthropy be to me!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

31. “You cannot but remember the lively enthusiasm which your discourse created. Oh! how I drank your words! How your eloquence seemed to steal me from myself! I scarcely dared to breathe, fearing to lose a syllable; and while you spoke, Methought a radiant glory beamed round your head, and your countenance shone with the majesty of a God. I.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

32. “Authorship is a mania to conquer which no reasons are sufficiently strong.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

33. “And swear, not wine itself would please, Had not the lip of Love first touched the flowing bowl! ‘Must.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

34. “He shuddered at the void which her absence would leave in his bosom. He.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

35. “No matter; Let me at least hear what She has to say. Do, my dear Aunt! Oblige me, I beseech you!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

36. “My Companion in danger seemed entirely to have got rid of her chagrin at being delayed. She laughed, and conversed with the family with infinite gaiety. I strove but in vain to follow her example. My.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

37. “Either I must die at present, or expire by the lingering torments of unsatisfied desire. Oh!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

38. “Folded in your arms, I shall sink to sleep; Your hand shall close my eyes for ever, and your lips receive my dying breath.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

39. “She was wise enough to hold her tongue. As this is the only instance known of a Woman’s ever having done so, it was judged worthy to be recorded here.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

40. “Eighteenth-century erotic writing tends to be materialist, figuring the body as mechanistic and seeking pleasure in physical rather than intellectual or spiritual passion. The.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

41. “Sensible? Why, She said nothing but ″Yes,″ and ″No″.′ ‘She did not say much more, I must confess – But then She always said ″Yes,″ or ″No,″ in the right place.’ ‘Did.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

42. “By sad experience I know what sorrows She must endure, who marries into a family unwilling to receive her.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

43. “Even at this moment I lament his loss, though ’tis to him that I owe all the miseries of my existence.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

44. “Sometimes I felt the bloated Toad, hideous and pampered with the poisonous vapours of the dungeon, dragging his loathsome length along my bosom: Sometimes the quick cold Lizard rouzed me leaving his slimy track upon my face, and entangling itself in the tresses of my wild and matted hair: Often have I at waking found my fingers ringed with the long worms which bred in the corrupted flesh of my Infant.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

45. “His hatred of society, his profound melancholy, his rigid observation of the duties of his order, and his voluntary seclusion from the world at his age so unusual, attracted the notice of the whole fraternity. He.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

46. “The Monk was published anonymously in three volumes on 12 March 1796; it sold for half a guinea.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

47. “My death preserves a life valuable to the world, and more dear to me than my own. Yes, Father; I am poisoned; But know, that the poison once circulated in your veins.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

48. “Artless yourself, you suspect not others of deceit; and viewing the world through the medium of your own truth and innocence, you fancy all who surround you to deserve your confidence and esteem. What.”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

49. “You have got no light!’ said Marguerite; ‘Is it your own neck or the Gentleman’s that you have a mind to break?”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis

50. “Tell me that you will conceal my story, that I shall remain your Friend and your Companion, or this poignard drinks my blood!”

— Matthew Gregory Lewis