A garland of quotations XCVI

Culled from the finest plum cakes in literary history, and re-woven every Wednesday

Of all kinds of reptiles only those that are not harmful are found in Ireland.…It has no dragons.
•Giraldus Cambrensis, Topography of Ireland (1188).

We are spared the rule of unicorns, the domination of phoenixes, and the restraints of human kings. We are free to do just as we like—we are infinitely lucky.
•Wu Cheng’en, Journey to the West (1592?).

There is something more terrible and marvelous than being devoured by a dragon; it is being a dragon.
•Borges, “Modes of G. K. Chesterton” (1936).

                   …The other horn
Of the unicorn.
•Borges, “Las Cosas” (1968).

Be dragonis baith and dowis ay in double forme, | [doves]
And quhen it nedis yow, onone, note baith ther strenthis.
•Dunbar, “The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo” (ca. 1500).

Do law elyk to aipis and unicornis. | [alike; apes]
•Dunbar, “The Thrissil and the Rois” (1503).

To save a mayd, St. George the Dragon slew,
A pretty tale if all is told be true;
Most say there are no Dragons, and ’tis sayd,
There was no George; pray God there was a mayd.
•John Aubrey, “To save a mayd” (C17).

They noticed that virginity was needed
To trap the unicorn in every case,
But not that, of those virgins who succeeded,
A high percentage had an ugly face.
•Auden, “The Quest” (1940).

Every dragon gives birth to a St. George who slays it.
•Gibran, Sand and Foam (1926).

Mord says that Omar
says that we are
all unicorns anyway.
•Principia Discordia 00028 (1963).

Sources: Giraldus: trans. J. J. O’Meara, The History and Topography of Ireland (Penguin, 1982); Wu: trans. W. J. F.Jenner (Foreign Language Press, 1990); Borges: Monegal & Reid, eds., Borges: A Reader (Dutton, 1981); Dunbar: James Kinsley, ed., Poems (U of Exeter, 1989); Aubrey: William J. Thoms, Anecdotes and Traditions, Illustrative of Early English History and Literature (Camden Society, 1839); some of this material is copyrighted, and I plead only fair use.