Flavor text/Real-world quotations

Magic cards have used real-world quotations (from classics and modern literature, the bible, famous speeches and sayings) in flavor text since Alpha. They were considered to have an immediate impact and built-in sense of history that in-setting flavor text also strived for, yet would take on subtly novel shades of meaning when presented on a Magic card. Later, R&D stopped doing them in order to devote more space to their own created worlds, characters and stories. For copyright reasons, the quotations were preferably in the public domain, from a source at least 100 years old. 
The Dark was the last expansion set to feature real-world quotations. According to Mark Rosewater, a compromise was reached that the basic set would have literary quotes and the expert expansions wouldn't, in order to showcase their own worlds. He argued that real-world literature would take players out of the world of dueling wizards and according to some, would make them feel like they're in school. Rosewater also stated that they wanted Magic to be fun, not "edutainment." Since then, literary quotes were relegated to starter-level set, core sets, promotional cards and From the Vault. They were eventually slowly phased out, making their last appearance in Magic 2014. However, they were revisited in 2020 on a card from the Secret Lair Happy Little Gathering Drop featuring Bob Ross's artwork and one of his characteristic quotes. In 2022, Artist Series: Nils Hamm followed up with four classical quotes.
According to research on this topic by Wizards of the Coast, the majority of people enjoy in world Magic flavor text over real world quotes.
==Card list==
Year	First appearance 	Card 	Quote 	Author 	Source 	Type
1993	Limited Edition 	 	O to be a dragon … of silkworm size or immense … 	Marianne Moore 	O to Be a Dragon 	Poem (1959)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	And topples round the dreary westA looming bastion fringed with fire. 	Alfred, Lord Tennyson 	In Memoriam 	Poem (1849)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	There are some qualities—some incorporate things,That have a double life, which thus is madeA type of twin entity which springsFrom matter and light, evinced in solid and shade. 	Edgar Allan Poe 	Silence 	Poem (1839)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	…There was no traceOf aught on that illumined face…. 	Samuel Coleridge 	Phantom 	Poem (1805)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	‘Do you know, I always thought Unicorns were fabulous monsters, too? I never saw one alive before!’‘Well, now that we have seen each other,’ said the Unicorn, ‘if you’ll believe in me, I’ll believe in you.’ 	Lewis Carroll 	Through the Looking-Glass 	Novel (1871)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	While, like a ghastly rapid river, Through the pale door,A hideous throng rush out forever, And laugh—but smile no more. 	Edgar Allan Poe 	The Haunted Palace 	Poem (1839)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	Should you a Rat to madness teaseWhy ev'n a Rat may plague you… 	Samuel Coleridge 	Recantation 	Poem (1798)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;It had been strange, even in a dream,To have seen those dead men rise. 	Samuel Coleridge 	The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 	Poem (1798)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	What else, when chaos draws all forces inward to shape a single leaf. 	Conrad Aiken 	The Room 	Poem (1930)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	And through the drifts the snowy cliffsDid send a dismal sheen:Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—The ice was all between. 	Samuel Coleridge 	The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 	Poem (1798)
1993	Limited Edition 	 	About, about in reel and routThe death-fires danced at night;The water, like a witch’s oils,Burnt green, and blue and white. 	Samuel Coleridge 	The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 	Poem (1798)
1993	Unlimitierte Auflage 	(German FWB) 	Das also war des Pudels Kern! Ein fahrender Skolast? Der Kassus macht mich lachen!(So that is then the essence of the brute? A travelling scholar? Time to laugh yet!) 	J.W. Goethe 	Faust 	Tragedy (1808)
1993	Tirage Non Limité 	(French FWB) 	Prince amiable, dis-nous si quelque ange au berceau Contre des assassins prit soin de te défendre (...)(Say, did an angel at thy cradle side, beloved prince! Against thy murderers defend thee with his care?) 	Racine 	Athalie 	Tragedy (1691)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	After these words the magician drew a ring off his finger, and put it on one of Aladdin’s, saying:‘It is a talisman against all evil, so long as you obey me.’ 	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	When he reached the entrance of the cavern, he pronounced the words,‘Open, Sesame!’ 	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	Four things that never meet do here uniteTo shed my blood and to ravage my heart,A radiant brow and tresses that beguileAnd rosy cheeks and a glittering smile. 	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	Expect my visit when the darkness comes.The night I think is best for hiding all. 	Ouallada 	Darkness 	Poem (11th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	We made tempestuous winds obedient to SolomonAnd many of the devilsWe also made obedient to him. 	 	The Qur'an, 21:81 	Religious text (7th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	Whoever obeys God and His Prophet,fears God and does his duty to Him,will surely find success. 	 	The Qur'an, 24:52 	Religious text (7th century)
1993	Arabian Nights 	 	For my confession they burned me with fireAnd found that I was for endurance made. 	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
1994	Revised 	(French FWB) 	J'appris de la sorte 'que l'île de Serendib avait quatre-vingts parasanges de longueur et quatre-vingts de largeur;qu'elle avait une montagne, qui était la plus haute de la terre.(I learned this way that the island of Serendib is eighty parasangs in length, and as many in breadth;that it had a mountain, which was the highest in the world.)	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
1994	Antiquities 	 	Born like a Phoenix from the Flame,But neither Bulk nor Shape the same. 	Jonathan Swift 	Vanbrug's House 	Poem (1708)
1994	Legends 	 	O! call back yesterday, bid time return. 	William Shakespeare 	King Richard the Second 	History play (1595)
1994	Legends 	 	Then flashed the living lightning from her eyes,And screams of horror rend th’ affrighted skies. 	Alexander Pope 	The Rape of the Lock 	Poem (1702)
1994	Legends 	 	If I must die, I will encounter darkness as a bride,And hug it in my arms. 	William Shakespeare 	Measure for Measure 	Comedy (1603)
1994	Legends 	 	Full fathom five thy father lies;Of his bones are coral made;Those are pearls that were his eyes;Nothing of him that doth fade,But doth suffer a sea-changeInto something rich and strange. 	William Shakespeare 	The Tempest 	Comedy (1610)
1994	Legends 	 	Adopt the character of the twisting octopus,which takes on the appearance of the nearby rock.Now follow in this direction,now turn a different hue. 	Theognis 	Elegies 1, 215 	Poem (6th century BC)
1994	Legends 	 	And the unclean spirits went out, and entered the swine: and the herd ran violently … . 	 	The Bible, Mark 5:13 	Religious text (1st century)
1994	Legends 	 	Flittering, wheeling,darting in to strike, and thengone just as you blink. 	 	Dragonfly Haiku 	Poem
1994	Legends 	 	The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix,Her ashes new-create another heirAs great in admiration as herself. 	William Shakespeare 	King Richard the Eighth 	History play (1613)
1994	Legends 	 	… [A]nd gives to airy nothingA local habitation and a name. 	William Shakespeare 	A Midsummer Night's Dream 	Comedy (1600)
1994	Legends 	 	O! it is excellentTo have a giant’s strength, but it is tyrannousTo use it like a giant. 	William Shakespeare 	Measure for Measure 	Comedy (1603)
1994	Legends 	 	The turtle lives ‘twixt plated decksWhich practically conceal its sex.I think it clever of the turtleIn such a fix to be so fertile. 	Ogden Nash 	The Turtle 	Poem (1945)
1994	Legends 	 	There is no calamity greater than lavish desires.There is no greater guilt than discontentment.And there is no greater disaster than greed. 	Lao Tzu 	Tao Té Ching 46 	Philosophical text (6th century BC)
1994	Legends 	 	Tis distance lends enchantment to the view,And robes the mountain in its azure hue. 	Thomas Campbell 	The Pleasures of Hope 	Poem (1799)
1994	Legends 	 	… The ghost rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head … he sometimes passes along the Hollow, like a midnight blast … 	Washington Irving 	The Legend of Sleepy Hollow 	Short story (1820)
1994	Legends 	 	High on a throne of royal state … insatiate to pursue vain war with heav'n. 	John Milton 	Paradise Lost 	Poem (1667)
1994	Legends 	 	The day of spirits; my soul’s calm retreatWhich none disturb! 	Henry Vaughan 	Silex Scintillans: The Night 	Poem (1650)
1994	Legends 	 	Then inch by inch out of the grass rose up the head and spread hood of Nag, the big black cobra,and he was five feet long from tongue to tail. 	Rudyard Kipling 	The Jungle Books(Rikki-Tikki-Tavi) 	Short story (1894)
1994	Legends 	 	And a horror of outer darkness after,And dust returneth to dust again. 	Adam Lindsay Gordon 	The Swimmer 	Poem (1870)
1994	Legends 	 	The smith a mighty man is heWith large and sinewy hands.And the muscles of his brawny armsAre strong as iron bands. 	Henry Wadsworth Longfellow	The Village Blacksmith 	Poem (1840)
1994	Legends 	 	To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,One clover, and a bee,And revery. 	Emily Dickinson 	To make a prairie 	Poem (1755)
1994	Legends 	 	… and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left. 	 	The Bible, Exodus 14:22 	Religious text (6th century BC)
1994	Legends 	 	This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks …Stand like Druids of old. 	Henry Wadsworth Longfellow	Evangeline 	Poem (1847)
1994	Legends 	 	Hi! ni! ya! Behold the man of flint, that’s me!Four lightnings zigzag from me, strike and return. 	 	Navajo war chant 	Chant (traditional)
1994	Legends 	 	Many are in high place, and of renown: but mysteries are revealed unto the meek. 	 	The Bible, Ecclesiastics 3:19 The quotation in the flavor text is from Ecclesiastics 3:19, not from Ecclesiastes 3:19 as mentioned on the card. This error was corrected in Chronicles 	Religious text (5th century BC)
1994	Legends 	 	How dull it is to pause, to make an end,To rust unburnished, not to shine in use,As though to breathe were life! 	Alfred, Lord Tennyson 	Ulysses 	Poem (1842)
1994	Legends 	 	Leviathan, too! Can you catch him with a fish-hook or run a line round his tongue? 	 	The Bible, Job 41:1The quotation in the flavor text is from Job 41:1, not Job 40:25 as mentioned on the card (although it is Job 40:25 in the original Hebrew text). This error was corrected in Fifth Edition.	Religious text (6th century BC)
1994	Legends 	 	When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world. 	William Shakespeare 	Hamlet 	Tragedy (ca. 1600)
1994	Legends 	 	Her lips suck forth; see, where it flies! 	Christopher Marlowe 	The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus 	Tragedy (ca. 1590)
1994	Legends 	 	An immense river of oblivion is sweeping us away into a nameless abyss. 	Ernest Renan 	Souvenirs d'Enfance et de Jeunesse 	Autobiography (1883)
1994	Legends 	 	Union may be strength, but it is mere blind brute strength unless wisely directed. 	Samuel Butler 	The Note-Books of Samuel Butler 	Note (1912)
1994	Legends 	 	It was full of fire and smoke and light and …it drove between us and the Efrafans like a thousand thunderstorms with lightning. 	Richard Adams 	Watership Down 	Novel (1972)
1994	Legends 	 	Fairest Isle, all isles excelling,Seat of pleasures, and of loves … 	John Dryden 	King Arthur 	Opera (1691)
1994	Legends 	 	Black spirits and white, red spirits and gray,Mingle, mingle, mingle, you that mingle may. 	Thomas Middleton 	The Witch 	Tragicomedy (1616)
1994	Legends 	 	You know what I was,You see what I am: change me, change me! 	Randall Jarrell 	The Woman at the Washington Zoo 	Poem (1960)
1994	Legends 	 	In the drowsy dark cave of the mind,dreams build their nest with fragments dropped from day’s caravan. 	Rabindranath Tagore 	Fireflies 	Aphorism (1912)
1994	Legends 	 	Resignedly beneath the skyThe melancholy waters lie.So blend the turrets and shadows thereThat all seem pendulous in air,While from a proud tower in townDeath looks gigantically down. 	Edgar Allan Poe 	The City in the Sea 	Poem (1845)
1994	Legends 	 	For something is amiss or out of placeWhen mice with wings can wear a human face. 	Theodore Roethke 	The Bat 	Poem (1941)
1994	Legends 	 	Visions of glory, spare my aching sight,Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul! 	Thomas Gray 	The Bard 	Poem (1757)
1994	Legends 	 	Tis the set of sails, and not the gales,Which tells us the way to go. 	Ella Wheeler Wilcox 	The Winds of Fate 	Poem (1916)
1994	Legends 	 	Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! 	William Shakespeare 	King Lear 	Tragedy (1606)
1994	Legends 	 	Give them great meals of beef and iron and steel, they will eat like wolves and fight like devils. 	William Shakespeare 	Henry V 	History play (1599)
1994	The Dark 	 	Must not all things at the last be swallowed up in death? 	Plato 	Phaedo 	Dialogue (4th century BC)
1994	The Dark 	 	Of twenty yeer of age he was, I gesse.Of his stature he was of evene lengthe.And wonderly delyvere, and of greete strengthe. 	Geoffrey Chaucer 	The Canterbury Tales(General Prologue) 	Short story (1400)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Mystic shadow, bending near me,Who art thou?Whence come ye? 	Stephen Crane 	Mystic shadow, bending near me 	Poem (1905)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	… Our castle’s strengthWill laugh a siege to scorn. 	William Shakespeare 	Macbeth 	Tragedy (1606)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Nothing endures but change. 	Heraclitus 	On Nature 	Philosophical text (5th century BC)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Unknown spearsSuddenly hurtle before my dream-awakened eyes … . 	William Butler Yeats 	The Valley Of The Black Pig 	Poem (1896)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,And seal the hushed casket of my soul. 	John Keats 	To Sleep 	Poem (1900)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	The raging winds …, settling on the sea, the surges sweep,Raise liquid mountains, and disclose the deep. 	Virgil 	Aeneid 	Poem (1st century BC)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	But who is to guard the guards themselves? 	Juvenal 	Satires 	Poem (2nd century BC)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	And the seraphs sob at vermin fangsIn human gore imbued. 	Edgar Allen Poe 	The Conqueror Wurm 	Poem (1843)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Crawing, crawing,For my crowse crawing,I lost the best feather i’ my wingFor my crowse crawing. 	 	Anonymous Scottish ballad 	Ballad
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	I too shall be brought low by death,but until then let me win glory. 	Homer 	The Iliad, Book XVIII 	Poem (9th century BC)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	The Soul selects her own Society—Then—shuts the Door— 	Emily Dickinson 	The Soul selects her own Society 	Poem (1862)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	Come one, come all! this rock shall flyFrom its firm base as soon as I. 	Sir Walter Scott 	The Lady of the Lake 	Poem (1810)
1997	Fifth Edition 	 	… When the trees bow down their heads,The wind is passing by. 	Christina Rossetti 	Who Has Seen the Wind? 	Poem (1947)
1997	Portal 	 	O miserable of happy! Is this the end Of this new glorious world … ? 	John Milton 	Paradise Lost 	Poem (1667)
1997	Portal 	 	As equal were their souls, so equal was their fate. 	John Dryden 	Ode to Mrs. Anne Killigrew 	Poem (1686)
1997	Portal 	 	… Before honor is humility. 	 	The Bible, Proverbs 15:33 	Religious text (BC)
1997	Portal 	 	I am that merry wanderer of the night. 	William Shakespeare 	A Midsummer Night's Dream 	Comedy (1600)
1997	Portal 	 	For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise. 	Samuel Coleridge 	Kubla Khan 	Poem (1797)
1997	Portal 	 	… inviting the soul to wander for a spell in abysses of solitude … . 	Kate Chopin 	The Awakening 	Novel (1899)
1997	Portal 	 	Twas when the seas were roaringWith hollow blasts of wind … . 	John Gay 	The What D'Ye Call It 	Poem (1715)
1997	Portal 	 	No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings. 	William Blake 	The Marriage of Heaven and Hell 	Poem (1793)
1997	Portal 	 	As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods. They kill us for their sport. 	William Shakespeare 	King Lear 	Tragedy (1606)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	Multiple cards (40 )	Multiple quotes 	Luo Guanzhong 	Three Kingdoms: A Historical Novel 	History novel (14th century)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	When you give offense to heaven, to whom can you pray? 	Confucius 	Analects 	Philosophical text (3rd century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	Barbarian tribes with their rulers are inferior to Chinese states without them. 	Confucius 	Analects 	Philosophical text (3rd century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	In raiding and plundering, be like fire, in immovability like a mountain. 	Sun Tzu 	The Art of War 	Military treatise (5th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	All warfare is based on deception. 	Sun Tzu 	The Art of War 	Military treatise (5th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	Thorn bushes spring up wherever the army has passed. Lean years follow in the wake of a great war. 	Lao Tzu 	Tao Te Ching 	Philosophical text (6th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	Those who know do not talk. Those who talk do not know. 	Lao Tzu 	Tao Te Ching 	Philosophical text (6th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	Unless you enter the tiger’s lair, you cannot get hold of the tiger’s cubs. 	Sun Tzu 	The Art of War 	Military treatise (5th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	Trying to meet a worthy man in the wrong way is as bad as closing the door on an invited guest. 	Mencius 	Mencius 	Philosophical text (4th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared. 	Sun Tzu 	The Art of War 	Military treatise (5th century BC)
1999	Portal Three Kingdoms 	 	To send the common people to war untrained is to throw them away. 	Confucius 	Analects 	Philosophical text (3rd century BC)
1999	Starter 1999 	 	Cursed be the sickly forms that err from honest Nature’s rule! 	Alfred, Lord Tennyson 	Locksley Hall 	Poem (1835)
1999	Starter 1999 	 	Fortune does not side with the faint-hearted. 	Sophocles 	Phaedra 	Tragedy (5th century BC)
1999	Starter 1999 	 	To-night the winds begin to rise … The rooks are blown about the skies … . 	Alfred, Lord Tennyson 	In Memoriam 	Poem (1849)
1999	Starter 1999 	 	Many wearing rapiers are afraid of goose-quills. 	William Shakespeare 	Hamlet 	Tragedy (ca. 1600)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards 	Lewis Carroll 	Through the Looking Glass 	Novel (1871)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	Returne from whence ye came… . 	Edmund Spenser 	The Faerie Queene 	Poem (1590)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	May the winds blow till they have wakened death… . 	William Shakespeare 	Othello 	Tragedy (1603)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	Knowledge is power. 	Sir Francis Bacon 	Meditationes Sacrae 	Religious meditation (1597)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,He passes from life to his rest in the grave. 	William Knox 	Mortality 	Poem (1824)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	Hence ‘banishèd’ is banished from the world,And the world’s exile is death. 	William Shakespeare 	Romeo and Juliet 	Tragedy (1597)
2001	Seventh Edition 	 	But high she shoots through air and light,Above all low delay,Where nothing earthly bounds her flight,Nor shadow dims her way. 	Thomas Moore 	Oh that I had Wings 	Hymn (1855)
2001	FNM card 	 	And in their blind and unattaining state their miserable lives have sunk so low that they must envy every other fate. 	Dante 	Inferno 	Poem (1320)
2001	FNM card 	 	Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war. 	William Shakespeare 	Julius Caesar 	Historic play (1599)
2001	FNM card 	 	I will … tell thee more than thou hast wit to ask. 	Christopher Marlowe 	The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus 	Tragedy (ca. 1590)
2001	FNM card 	 	I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately. 	Henry David Thoreau 	Walden 	Memoir (1854)
2001	FNM card 	 	Peace hath her victories No less renownd than war. 	John Milton 	To the Lord General Cromwell 	Poem (1852)
2001	Junior Super Series 	 	Enter this palace-gate and ask the newsOf greatness fallen into dust and clay. 	 	The Arabian Nights 	Folk tale (9th century)
2001	Judge Gift 	 	Life, struck sharp on death, Makes awful lightning. 	Elizabeth Barrett Browning	Aurora Leigh 	Poem (1856)
2001	Magic Player Reward 	 	I will show you fear in a handful of dust. 	T. S. Eliot 	The Waste Land 	Poem (1922)
2002	FNM card 	 	The chill, to him who breathed it, drewDown with his blood, till all his heart was cold. 	Alfred, Lord Tennyson 	Idylls of the King 	Poem (1869)
2002	FNM card 	 	One pain is lessened by another’s anguish. 	William Shakespeare 	Romeo and Juliet 	Tragedy (1597)
2002	FNM card 	 	Fire is the test of gold; adversity of strong men. 	Seneca 	On Providence 	Dialogue (64)
2002	FNM card 	 	Everything in Nature contains all the powers of Nature. 	Ralph Waldo Emerson 	Compensation 	Essay (1841)
2002	FNM card 	 	When good men die their goodness does not perish,But lives though they are gone. 	Euripides 	Temenidae 	Tragedy (5th century BC)
2002	Judge Gift 	 	Tis a shame, in such a tempest, to have but one anchor. 	Laurence Sterne 	Tristram Shandy 	Novel (1759)
2002	Arena League promo 	 	A wisp of life remains in the undergloom of Death; a visible form, though no heart beats within it. 	Homer 	The Iliad 	Poem (9th century BC)
2002	Arena League promo 	 	If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts. 	Sir Francis Bacon 	Advancement of Learning 	Letter (1605)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Words — so innocent and powerless are they, as standing in a dictionary;how potent for good and evil they become to one who knows how to combine them! 	Nathaniel Hawthorne 	The American Notebooks (1835 - 1853) 	Note (1848)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	It is better to take what does not belong to you than to let it lie around neglected. 	Mark Twain 	More Maxims of Mark 	Note (1927)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once. 	William Shakespeare 	Julius Caesar 	Historic play (1599)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Ha, banishment? Be merciful, say ‘death,’For exile hath more terror in his look,Much more than death. 	William Shakespeare 	Romeo and Juliet 	Tragedy (1597)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Neither could I forget what I had read of these pitsthat the sudden extinction of life formed no part of their most horrible plan. 	Edgar Allan Poe 	The Pit and the Pendulum 	Short story (1842)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	A good deal of tyranny goes by the name of protection. 	Crystal Eastman 	Equality or Protection 	Column (1924)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	The Eye altering alters all. 	William Blake 	The Mental Traveller 	Poem (1863)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry. 	David Banner 	The Incredible Hulk 	Catchphrase (1978)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	The horror. The horror. 	Joseph Conrad 	Heart of Darkness 	Novella (1899)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	The love of nature …is a furious, burning, physical greed… . 	Mary Webb 	The House in Dormer Forest 	Short story (1920)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow. 	Aesop 	Fables 	Fable (6th century BC)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Before my eyes was a horrible monster, worthy to figure in the legends of the marvellous… .Its eight arms, or rather feet, fixed to its head …were twice as long as its body, and were twisted like the furies’ hair. 	Jules Verne 	Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea 	Novel (1870)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	We do not suddenly fall on death,but advance towards it by slight degrees;we die every day. 	Seneca 	Epistles 	Letter (1st century)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. 	William Shakespeare 	Troilus and Cressida 	Tragedy (1602)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Of all the tyrannies on humane kind The worst is that which persecutes the mind. 	John Dryden 	The Hind and the Panther 	Poem (1687)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Let me redeem my brothers both from death. 	William Shakespeare 	Titus Andronicus 	Tragedy (ca. 1600)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Over the silver mountains,Where spring the nectar fountains,There will I kiss The bowl of bliss;And drink my everlasting fill… . 	Sir Walter Raleigh 	The Pilgrimage 	Poem (ca. 1603)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately. 	Benjamin Franklin 	Life of Franklin 	Quote (1776)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Rats, rats, rats! Hundreds, thousands, millions of them, and every one a life. 	Bram Stoker 	Dracula 	Novel (1897)
2003	Eighth Edition 	 	Wealth means power; the power to subdue, to crush, to exploit, the power to enslave, to outrage, to degrade. 	Emma Goldman 	Anarchism 	Essay (1910)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	Sit down and read. Educate yourself for the coming conflicts. 	Mary Harris "Mother" Jones	Speech to railroad workers. 	Speech (1880's)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,—The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells. 	Wilfred Owen 	Anthem for Doomed Youth 	Poem (1917)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	Earth’s increase, foison plenty, Barns and garners never empty:Vines with clust'ring bunches growing;Plants with goodly burden bowing. 	William Shakespeare 	The Tempest 	Comedy (1610)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death. 	Mary Shelley 	Frankenstein 	Novel (1818)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	The hour of your redemption is here… . Rally to me… . rise and strike. Strike at every favorable opportunity. For your homes and hearths, strike! 	General Douglas MacArthur 	Speech to the people of the Philippines. 	Speech (1944)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream. 	Ralph Waldo Emerson 	Illusions 	Essay (1860)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat. 	Queen Victoria 	Letter to Arthur Balfour during the Boer War. 	Letter (1899)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace, and the brightest thunder-bolt is elicited from the darkest storm. 	Charles Colton 	Lacon; or Many Things in Few Words; Addressed to Those Who Think 	Note (1828)
2005	Ninth Edition 	 	No person was ever honored for what he received. Honor has been the reward for what he gave. 	Calvin Coolidge 	Have Faith in Massachusetts: A Collection of Speeches and Messages 	Speech (1916)
2006	Judge Gift 	 	The tyrannous and bloody deed is done, The most arch deed of piteous massacre That ever yet this land was guilty of. 	William Shakespeare 	Richard III 	Historic play (1897)
2006	Judge Gift 	 	She is a theme of honor and reknown,…Whose present courage may beat down our foes. 	William Shakespeare 	Troilus and Cressida 	Tragedy (1602)
2007	Tenth Edition 	 	The East Wind, an interloper in the dominions of Westerly Weather, is an impassive-faced tyrant with a sharp poniard held behind his back for a treacherous stab. 	Joseph Conrad 	The Mirror of the Sea 	Memoir (1906)
2007	Tenth Edition 	(French ) 	Cloués au sol, de honte et de céphalalgies …(Nailed to the earth, in shame and mental horror ...) 	Arthur Rimbaud 	Poésies: First Communions 	Poem (1871)
2007	Tenth Edition 	 	Not by age but by capacity is wisdom gained. 	Titus Maccius Plautus 	Trinummus 	Comedy (2nd century BC)
2007	Gateway card 	 	Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power. 	René Descartes 	Discourse on Method 	Philosophical treatise (1637)
2007	Gateway card 	 	As if his chest had been a mortar, he burst his hot heart’s shell upon it. 	Herman Melville 	Moby Dick 	Novel (1851)
2008	From the Vault: Dragons 	 	The dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth. 	William Shakespeare 	Troilus and Cressida 	Tragedy (1602)
2009	Magic 2010 	 	The ground polluted floats with human gore,And human carnage taints the dreadful shoreFly swift the dangerous coast: let every earBe stopp’d against the song! ‘tis death to hear! 	Homer 	The Odyssey 	Poem (9th century BC)
2010	Magic 2011 	 	Nature is a mutable cloud which is always and never the same. 	Ralph Waldo Emerson 	Essays 	Essay (1841)
2010	Magic 2011 	 	It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness. 	Seneca 	Epistles 	Letter (1st century)
2010	Magic 2011 	 	‘That was a narrow escape!’ said Alice, a good deal frightened at the sudden change, but very glad to find herself still in existence.’ 	Lewis Carroll 	Alice's Adventures in Wonderland 	Novel (1865)
2011	Magic 2012 	 	How blessed are some people, whose lives have no fears, no dreads, to whom sleep is a blessing that comes nightly, and brings nothing but sweet dreams. 	Bram Stoker 	Dracula 	Novel (1897)
2012	Magic 2013 	 	Not to be. That is the answer.Rif on To be or not to be. 	William Shakespeare 	Hamlet 	Tragedy (ca. 1600)
2013	Magic 2014 	 	Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety. 	William Shakespeare 	Henry IV, Part I 	History play (1597)
2013	Magic 2014 	 	All armies prefer high ground to low and sunny places to dark. 	Sun Tzu 	The Art of War 	Military treatise (5th century BC)
2020	Happy Little Gathering 	 	We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents. 	Bob Ross 	The Joy of Painting 	Instructional television show (1983-1994)
2022	Artist Series: Nils Hamm	 	Blue, glossy green, and velvet blackThey coiled and swam; and every trackWas a flash of fire. 	Samuel Taylor Coleridge 	The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 	Poem (1798)
2022	Artist Series: Nils Hamm	 	Tell me Muse, of that man,so ready at need, who wandered far and wide. 	Homer 	The Odyssey 	Poem (9th century BC)
2022	Artist Series: Nils Hamm	 	Deep into that darkness, peeringThey coiled and swam; and every trackI stood there wondering, fearing. 	Edgar Allan Poe 	The Raven 	Poem (1845)
2022	Artist Series: Nils Hamm	 	"The name of it", said the lady, "is Excalibur". 	Sir Thomas Mallory 	Le Morte d'Arthur 	Prose (1485)
2024	Sheldon's Spellbook 	 	"If you’re doing it alone, you’re doing it wrong." 	Sheldon Menery 	 	Quotation
2024	Sheldon's Spellbook 	 	“You did it to yourself.” 	Sheldon Menery 	Commander deck name. 	Sheldon's signature deck.
2024	Sheldon's Spellbook 	 	“I’m not great at everything, but I am great at one thing: surrounding myself with excellent people. And that tends to take care of the rest.” 	Sheldon Menery 	Gavin Verhey 	Quotation
2024	Sheldon's Spellbook 	 	From this day to the ending of the world,But we in it shall be remembered;We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;For he to-day that sheds his blood with meShall be my brother... 	William Shakespeare 	Henry V 	History play (1599)
2024	Sheldon's Spellbook 	 	“Hate has no place here.” 	Sheldon Menery 	 	Quotation
==Universes Beyond==
Many Universes Beyond cards feature quotes from their respective properties.
IP 	Set(s)	Notes
The Walking Dead 	
*The Walking Dead	Quotes are taken from the The Walking Dead television series.
Stranger Things 	
*Stranger Things	Quotes are taken from the Stranger Things television series.
Arcane 	
*Arcane	Quotes are taken from the Arcane television series.
Warhammer 40,000 	
*Warhammer 40,000Commander decks
*Warhammer 40,000: Orks
*Warhammer Age of Sigmar
*Blood Bowl	Most quotes and flavor text are taken from Warhammer 40,000 books.
Transformers 	
*
* 	Quotes are taken from Transformers toys, television series, and movies.
The Lord of the Rings 	
*Tales of Middle-Earth
*Tales of Middle-earth Holiday release	All flavor text is quoted or paraphrased from The Lord of the Rings novel.
Doctor Who 	
*Doctor Who
*Doctor Who: Dalek Lands
*Doctor Who: Weeping Angels
*Doctor Who: Regeneration	Quotes are taken from Doctor Who television series and movies.
Evil Dead 	
* 	Quotes are taken from Evil Dead television series and movies.
The Princess Bride 	
* 	Quotes are taken from The Princess Bride film.
Jurassic Park / Jurassic World	
*Jurassic World
*	Quotes are taken from the Jurassic Park film franchise.
Tomb Raider 	
* 	Quotes are taken from the Tomb Raider video game series.
Fallout 	
*Fallout
*	Quotes and most other flavor text are taken from the Fallout video game series.
Assassin's Creed 	
*Assassin's Creed
*Assassin's Creed: Lethal Legends	Quotes are taken from the Assassin's Creed video game series.
Monty Python 	
*Monty Python and the Holy Grail: Vol. 1
*Monty Python and the Holy Grail: Vol. 2	Quotes are taken from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Ghostbusters 	
*Ghostbusters: Slimer
*The Real Ghostbusters	Quotes are taken from the Ghostbusters films and TV series.
Child's Play 	
*Child's Play	Quotes are taken from the Child's Play films.
==Notes and references==
Category:Trivia