quotations about the belly
It is a difficult matter, my fellow citizens, to argue with the belly, since it has no ears.
MARCUS CATO
Plutarch's Lives
The belly robs the back.
JAMES HOWELL
Proverbs
you don't say no
with an empty belly
and a barbed wire bonnet on a wolf
hangin' at your door
PATTY LARKIN
"Wolf at the Door"
Your belly chimes, it's time to go to dinner.
JOHN RAY
English Proverbs
To a haughty belly, kindness is hard to swallow and harder to digest.
ZORA NEALE HURSTON
Moses: Man of the Mountain
He who does not mind his belly will hardly mind anything else.
SAMUEL JOHNSON
The Life of Samuel Johnson
A belly full of gluttony will never study willingly.
THOMAS FULLER
Gnomologia
A full stomach is the Mother of all Evil.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1744
I say, whatever you maintain
Of Alma in the heart or brain,
The plainest man alive may tell ye
Her seat of empire is the belly.
From hence she sends out those supplies
Which make us either stout or wise;
The strength of every other member
Is founded on your belly-timber.
MATTHEW PRIOR
Alma
I can reason down or deny everything except this perpetual belly: feed he must and will, and I cannot make him respectable.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
Representative Men
What avails it us to have our bellies full of meat if it be not digested?
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE
Essays
My belly's as cold as if I had swallowed snowballs for pills.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
The Merry Wives of Windsor
A gross belly does not produce a refined mind.
ST. JEROME
attributed, The Home Book of Quotations
A full belly neither fights nor flies well.
GEORGE HERBERT
Jacula Prudentum
A bellyfull is a bellyfull.
FRANÇOIS RABELAIS
Works
May God look with hatred on the belly and its food; it is through them that chastity breaks down.
PALLADAS
attributed, Greek Anthology
The vilest of beasts is the belly.
GREEK PROVERB
Your belly will never let your back be warm.
THOMAS FULLER
Gnomologia
The belly is not filled with fair words.
FRANÇOIS RABELAIS
Works
When the belly is empty, the body becomes spirit; and when it is full, the spirit becomes body.
SAADI
attributed, Wise Old Sayings