"True," quoth Sancho, "but I have heard say there are more friars in Heaven than knights-errant."
"It may well be so," replied Don Quixote, "because their number is much greater than that of knights-errant."
"And yet," quoth Sancho, "there are abundance of the errant sort."
"Abundance, indeed," answered Don Quixote, "but few who deserve the name of knight."
There is a time for jesting, and a time when jokes are unseasonable.
Truth may bend but never break, and will ever rise above falsehood, like oil above water.
With lovers the external actions and gestures are couriers, which bear authentic tidings of what is passing in the interior of the soul.
Where you meet with no books you need expect no bacon.
The hare often starts where the hunter least expects her.
There is a remedy for everything but death, who will take us in his clutches spite of our teeth.
Show me who thou art with, and I will tell thee what thou art.
Not with whom thou wert bred, but with whom thou art fed.
Sorrow was made for man, not for beasts; yet if men encourage melancholy too much, they become no better than beasts.
"Thou bringest me good news, then?" cried Don Quixote.
"So good," answered Sancho, "that your worship has only to clap spurs to Rozinante, and get out upon the plain, to see the lady Dulcinea del Toboso, who, with a couple of her damsels, is coming to pay your worship a visit."
"Gracious Heaven!" exclaimed Don Quixote, "what dost thou say? Take care that thou beguilest not my real sorrow by a counterfeit joy."
"What should I get," answered Sancho, "by deceiving your worship, only to be found out the next moment? Come, sir, put on, and you will see the princess our mistress all arrayed and adorned--in short, like herself. She and her damsels are one blaze of naming gold; all strings of pearls, all diamonds, all rubies, all cloth of tissue above ten hands deep; their hair loose about their shoulders, like so many sunbeams blowing about in the wind; and what is more, they come mounted upon three pied belfreys, the finest you ever laid eyes on."
"Palfreys, thou wouldst say, Sancho," quoth Don Quixote.
"Well, well," answered Sancho, "belfreys and palfreys are much the same thing; but let them be mounted how they will, they are sure the finest creatures one would wish to see; especially my mistress the princess Dulcinea, who dazzles one's senses."
