A Man For All Seasons Quotes & Descriptions

if you could just see facts flat on, without that horrible moral squint; with just a little common sense, you could have been a statesman

Cardinal Wolsey

megalomaniac ambition unhappily matched by an excelling intellect

Cardinal Wolsey

no, Catherine's his wife and she's as barren as a brick

Cardinal Wolsey

old, a bid decayed body in scarlet

Cardinal Wolsey

"The Loyal Subject"... a pub.

Common Man

I'm breathing... are you breathing too?... it's nice, isn't it? it isn't difficult to keep alive, friends- just don't make trouble- or if you must make trouble, make the sort of trouble that's expected. well, I don't need to tell you that. good night. if we should bump into one another, recognize me.

Common Man

crafty, loosely benevolent, base humor

Common Man

it is perverse to stay a play made up of kings and cardinals

Common Man

my master Thomas More would give anything to anyone. some say that's good and some say that's bad, but I say he can't help it- and that's bad...because some day someone's going to ask him for something that he wants to keep; and he'll be out of practice

Common Man

now, damn me, isn't that them all over! miss?... he... miss?... miss me?... what's in me for him to miss?... all right, so he's down on his luck! I'm sorry. I don't mind saying that: I'm sorry! bad luck! if I'd any good luck to spare he could have some. I wish we could all have good luck, all the time!

Common Man

the great things not to get out of your depth... what I can tell thems common knowledge! but now they've given money for it and everyone wants value for his money. they'll make a secret of it now to prove they've not been bilked... mm... oh, when I can't touch the bottom I'll go deaf, blind, and dumb. and that's more than I earn in a fortnight!

Common Man

the sixteenth century is the century of the common Man, like all the other centuries, and that's my proposition

Common Man

whether we follow tradition in ascribing Wolseys death to a broken heart, or accept professor larcombs less feeling diagnosis of pulmonary pneumonia, it's effective cause was the kings displeasure

Common Man

you understand my position sir, there's nothing I can do; I'm a plain, simple man and just want to keep out of trouble

Common Man

Thomas, Thomas, does a man need a pope to tell him when he's sinned? it was a sin, Thomas; I admit it; I repent. and god has punished me. I have no son... son after son she's borne me, Thomas, all dead at birth, or dead within the month

King Henry

golden hope of new learning

King Henry

the levity with which he handles his absolute power for shadows his future corruption

King Henry

well I dance superlatively... that's a dancers leg Margaret... hey, Norfolk? now that's a wrestlers leg. but I can throw him.

King Henry

you must consider Thomas, that I stand in peril of my soul. it was no marriage; she was my brothers widow

King Henry

in any State that was half good, you would be raised up high, not here, for what you've done already. it's not your fault the states three quarters bad. then if you elect to suffer for it, you elect yourself a hero

Margaret

I'm lamenting. I've lost my innocence.

Richard Rich

academic hounded by self doubt longing to be in the world of affairs

Richard Rich

but every man has his price

Richard Rich

im adrift. help me.

Richard Rich

I think you'd make a good collector of revenues for York Diocese

Thomas Cromwell

a self conceit that can cradle gross crimes in the name of effective action

Thomas Cromwell

get sure. no, it's not like that, it's much more a matter of convenience, administrative convenience

Thomas Cromwell

mm- that ideas like these life lines they have on the embankment: comforting, but you don't expect to have to use them

Thomas Cromwell

you are John Dauncey. a general dealer?

Thomas Cromwell

I can't relieve you of your obedience to the king, Howard. you must relieve yourself of our friendship. no ones safe now, and you have a son.

Thomas More

I neither could nor would rule my king. but there's a little... little, area... where I must rule myself. it's very little- less to him than a tennis court. look; it was eight o'clock. at eight o'clock, Lady Anne likes to dance

Thomas More

a man should go where he won't be tempted

Thomas More

adamantine sense of his own self

Thomas More

and what would you do with a water spaniel that was afraid of water? you'd hang it! well, as a spaniel is to water, so is a man to his own self.

Thomas More

and when the last law was down, and the devil turned round on you- where would you hide, roper, the laws all being flat? this country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast- mans laws, not gods- and if you cut them down- and you're just the man to do it- d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? yes, I'd give the devil the benefit of the law, for my own safety's sake.

Thomas More

and when we stand before god, and you are sent to paradise for doing according to your conscience, and I am damned for not doing according to mine, will you come with me, for fellowship?

Thomas More

but what matters to me is not whether it's true or not but that I believe it to be true, or rather, not that I believe it, but that I believe it... I trust i make myself obscure?

Thomas More

for wales? why, Richard, it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world... but for Wales!

Thomas More

hero of selfhood

Thomas More

if Wolsey fell, the splash would swamp a few small boats like ours. there will be o new chancellors while Wolsey lives

Thomas More

listen Roper. two years ago you were a passionate Churchman; now you're a passionate Lutheran. we must just pray that when your head's finished turning, your face is to the front again

Thomas More

no, sheer simplicity. the law, roper, the law. I know what's legal not what's right. and I'll stick to what's legal.

Thomas More

oh, sweet jesus! these plain, simple men!

Thomas More

old roper was just the same. now let him think he's going with the current and he'll turn round and start swimming in the opposite direction. what we want is a really substantial attack on the church

Thomas More

heavy, active, a sportsman, and soldier

Duke of Norfolk

held together by a rigid adherence to the minimal code of conventional duty

Duke of Norfolk

I have no queen! Catherine is not my wife and no priest can make her so, and they that say she is my wife are not only liars... but traitors! mind it, Thomas!

King Henry

that's very neat. but look now.. if we lived in a state where virtue was profitable, common sense would make us good, and greed would make us saintly. and we'd live like animals or angels in the happy land that needs no heroes. but in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and though, and have to choose, to be human at all.. why then perhaps we must stand fast a little- even at the risk of being heroes

Thomas More

then it's a poor argument to call it "neat," Meg. when a man takes an oath, Meg, he's ho,ding his own self in his own hands. like water. and if he opens his fingers then- he needn't hole to find himself again. some men aren't capable of this, but I'd be loathe to think your father one of them.

Thomas More

well... I believe, when statemen forsake their own private conscience for the sake of their public duties... they lead their country by a short route to chaos

Thomas More

must everything be made convenient? I'm not a convenient man, Meg- I've got an inconvenient conscience!

Will Roper

the church is heretical! Doctor Luther's proved that to my satisfaction!

Will Roper