Honey Bee Quotes

• For so work the honey bees, creatures that by a rule in nature teach the act of order to a peopled kingdom.

  William Shakespeare

  Order, Bees And Honey, Kingdoms

  'Henry V' (1599) act 1, sc. 2, l. 187

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• The honey-bee's great ambition is to be rich, to lay up great stores, to possess the sweet of every flower that blooms. She is more than provident. Enough will not satisfy her, she must have all she can get by hook or crook.

  John Burroughs

  Sweet, Flower, Ambition

  John Burroughs (2008). “Pepacton”, p.58, Wildside Press LLC

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• The bee is more honored than other animals, not because she labors, but because she labors for others.

  Saint John Chrysostom

  Animal, Bees, Labor

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• Give and Take...
  For to the bee a flower is a fountain if life
  And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love
  And to both, bee and flower,
  the giving and the receiving is a need and an ecstasy.

  Khalil Gibran

  Love, Life, Nature

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• Life is the flower for which love is the honey.

  Victor Hugo

  Love, Life, Positive

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• If honey bees become extinct, human society will follow in four years.

  Ernest A. Fortin

  Years, Four, Honey

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• Hope is the only bee that makes honey without flowers.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Inspirational, Hope, Nature

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1907). “The works of Robert G. Ingersoll”, p.4655, Library of Alexandria

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• One can no more approach people without love than one can approach bees without care. Such is the quality of bees.

  Leo Tolstoy

  Nature, People, Quality

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• The keeping of bees is like the direction of sunbeams.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Animal, Bees And Honey, Sunbeams

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• The honey is sweet, but the Bee stings.

  George Herbert

  Sweet, Honey, Bees

  George Herbert, Izaak Walton, Barnabas Oley (1848). “The Remains of that Sweet Singer of The Temple, George Herbert ...”, p.255

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• Buckminster Fuller himself was fond of stating that what seems to be happening at the moment is never the full story of what is really going on. He liked to point out that for the honey bee, it is the honey that is important. But the bee is at the same time nature's vehicle for carrying out cross-pollination of the flowers. Interconnectedness is a fundamental principle of nature. Nothing is isolated. Each event connects with others.

  Jon Kabat-Zinn

  Flower, Important, Fundamentals

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• How doth the little busy bee
  Improve each shining hour,
  And gather honey all the day
  From every opening flower!

  Isaac Watts

  Flower, Shining, Littles

  Divine Songs for Children "Against Idleness and Mischief " l. 1 (1715) See Carroll 5

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• The busy bee has no time for sorrow.

  William Blake

  Time, Sorrow, Bees

  William Blake, William Butler Yeats (2002). “Collected Poems”, p.166, Psychology Press

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• It takes a bee to get the honey out

  Arthur Guiterman

  Honey, Bees

  Arthur Guiterman (1924). “A Poet's Proverbs: Being Mirthful, Sober, and Fanciful Epigrams on the Universe, with Certain Old Irish Proverbs, All in Rhymed Complets”, New York, E.P. Dutton [1924]

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• Every saint has a bee in his halo.

  E. V. Lucas

  Halos, Saint, Bees And Honey

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• What is not good for the swarm is not good for the bee.

  Marcus Aurelius

  Freedom, Bees And Honey, Busy Bee

  Marcus Aurelius (Emperor of Rome) (1928). “Marcus Aurelius Antoninus to Himself”

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• A spoonful of honey will catch more flies than a gallon of vinegar.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Food, Catching Fire, Vinegar

  Benjamin Franklin (2004). “Poor Richard's Almanack”, p.117, Barnes & Noble Publishing

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• Honey bees are amazing creatures. I mean, think about it, do earwigs make chutney?

  Eddie Izzard

  Mean, Thinking, Honey

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• Just as the seasons change and the honey bees pollinate the planet and make honey, we are also doing exactly what we are supposed to be doing. We also are apart of nature, certainly not separate from nature.

  Bryan Kest

  Honey, Bees, Planets

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• The pedigree of honey does not concern the bee; A clover, any time, to him is aristocracy.

  Emily Dickinson

  Spring, Food, Animal

  "The pedigree of honey" l.1 (ca. 1884)

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• O Spirit of the Summertime! Bring back the roses to the dells; The swallow from her distant clime, The honey-bee from drowsy cells. Bring back the friendship of the sun; The gilded evenings, calm and late, When merry children homeward run, And peeping stars bid lovers wait. Bring back the singing; and the scent Of meadowlands at dewy prime;- Oh, bring again my heart's content, Thou Spirit of the Summertime!

  William Allingham

  Summer, Running, Stars

  William Allingham (1865). “Fifty Modern Poems”, p.49

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• Let us not go hurrying about and collecting honey, bee-like buzzing here and there for a knowledge of what is not to be arrived at, but let us open our leaves like a flower, and be passive and receptive, budding patiently under the eye of Apollo, and taking hints from every noble insect that favours us with a visit - sap will be given us for meat and dew for drink.

  John Keats

  Flower, Knowledge, Eye

  John Keats (2002). “Selected Letters”, p.63, Oxford University Press, USA

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• As for me, I know nothing else but miracles,
  Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan,
  Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky,
  Or wade with naked feet along the beach just in the edge of the water,
  Or stand under the trees in the woods,
  Or talk by day with any one I love,
  Or sleep in bed at night with any one I love,
  Or watch honey bees busy around the hive of a summer forenoon...
  Or the wonderfulness of the sundown,
  Or of stars shining so quiet and bright,
  Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in spring...
  What stranger miracles are there?

  Walt Whitman

  Summer, Beach, Stars

  Walt Whitman, “Miracles”

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• Bees work for man, and yet they never bruise
  Their Master's flower, but leave it having done,
  As fair as ever and as fit to use;
  So both the flower doth stay and honey run.

  George Herbert

  Running, Flower, Men

  George Herbert (1835). “The Works of George Herbert: Poems”, p.121

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• What a kid I got, I told him about the birds and the bee and he told me about the butcher and my wife.

  Rodney Dangerfield

  Funny, Humor, Kids

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