Honey Bee Quotes

“Wehehehehell, if it isn't Ollie-Ollie-oxidant-free ... "
You can take ... all the tea in China ... put it in a big brown ... bag for me.
He's as sweet as tupelo honey; he's an angel of the first degree.
Men with insight ... men in granite ... knights in armor bent on ... chivalry.
He's as sweet as ... tupelo honey; just like honey, baby ... from the bee."
=> For those who read and liked "When Irish eyes are sparkling"
Can i have a musician here?”

— Tom Collins

“Togetherness is the key to success: a lone bee makes hardly any honey; a lone man makes hardly any money.”

— Vinita Kinra

“Droughts especially appear to have accompanied the spirits of the dead in bee-form, and for this reason the honey offering was almost always customary in rain-magic, and the power of predicting rain was attributed to the bee.”

— Hilda M. Ransome

“Like the bee, we distill poison from honey for our self-defense
what happens to the bee if it uses its sting is well known.”

— Dag Hammarskjld

“Once upon a time there was a bear and a bee who lived in a wood and were the best of friends. All summer long the bee collected nectar from morning to night while the bear lay on his back basking in the long grass. When winter came the bear realised he had nothing to eat and thought to himself 'I hope that busy little bee will share some of his honey with me.' But the bee was nowhere to be found - he had died of a stress induced coronary disease.”

— Banksy

“Mantova
The first thing I saw in the morning
Was a huge golden bee ploughing
His burly right shoulder into the belly
Of a sleek yellow pear
Low on a bough.
Before he could find that sudden black honey
That squirms around in there
Inside the seed, the tree could not bear any more.
The pear fell to the ground,
With the bee still half alive
Inside its body.
He would have died had I not knelt down
And sliced the pear gently
A little more open.
The bee shuddered, and returned.
Maybe I should have left him a lone there
Drowning in his own delight.
The best days are the first
To flee.”

— Richard Wilbur

“There were so many miracles at work: that a blossom might become a peach, that a bee could make honey in its thorax, that rain might someday fall. I thought then about the seasons changing, and in the gray of night I could almost will myself to see the azure sky, the gold of the maple leaves, the crimson of the ripe apples, the hoarfrost on the grass.”

— Jane Hamilton

“I don't even get the term, "the birds and the bees". 
How does that properly teach a kid about sex?  You never see a pigeon railing a
dove or a honey bee sticking it to a bumble bee.”

— Tara Sivec

“An intellectual instinct which extracts the essence from the phenomena of life, as a bee sucks honey from a flower. In addition to study and reflections, life itself serves as a source.”

— Carl Von Clausewitz

“I must say that anyone who passed through those years [of World War II] without understanding that man produces evil as a bee produces honey, must have been blind or wrong in the head.”

— William Golding

“I climbed into the honey wagon with my hair uncombed, with May handing me buttered toast and orange juice through the window and Rosaleen sticking in thermoses of water, both of them practically running alongside the truck while August rolled out of the driveway. I felt like the Red Cross springing to action to save the bee queendom.”

— Sue Monk Kidd

“We ought to do good to others as simply as a horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after season without thinking of the grapes it has borne.”

— Marcus Aurelius

“Some men, when they do you a kindness, at once demand the payment of gratitude from you; others are more modest than this. However, they remember the favor, and look upon you as their debtor in a manner. A third sort shall scarce know what they have done. These are much like a vine, which is satisfied by being fruitful in its kind, and bears a bunch of grapes without expecting any thanks for it. A fleet horse or greyhound do not make a noise when they have done well, nor a bee neither when she has made a little honey. And thus a man that has done a kindness never proclaims it, but does another as soon as he can, just like a vine that bears again the next season. Now we should imitate those who are so obliging as hardly to reflect on their beneficence (v. 6).”

— Marcus Aurelius

“Hope is the only bee that makes honey without flowers.”

— Robert Green Ingersoll

“326. Excessive reading does not make us smarter. Some people simply
"devour" books. They do it without the necessary intervals of thought, which are necessary in order to "digest," to process what has been read, to absorb and comprehend it. When people of that kind speak, pieces of Hegel, Heidegger and Marx come out raw, unprocessed. Reading requires personal contribution as much
as a bee requires "inner" work, as well as time, to transform pollen into honey.”

— Alija Izetbegović

“We may like the honey without liking the bee, but this will not be ethical!”

— Mehmet Murat Ildan

“A brier rose whose buds yield fragrant harvest for the honey bee.”

— Letitia Elizabeth Landon

“The bee collects honey from flowers in such a way as to do the least damage or destruction to them, and he leaves them whole, undamaged and fresh, just as he found them.”

— Saint Francis De Sales

“Behold! I am weary of my wisdom, like the bee that has gathered too much honey; I need hands outstretched to take it from me. I wish to spread it and bestow it, until the wise have once more become joyous in their folly, and the poor happy in their riches.”

— Friedrich Nietzsche

“For the bee, honey is the ultimate reality. It represents the fulfillment of her life mission, the triumph over her enemies, the continuity of the hive, the justification for working herself to death. Honey is to bees what money in the bank is to people-a measure of prosperity and well-being. But there is nothing abstract or symbolic about honey, as there is about money, which has no intrinsic value. There is more real wealth in a pound of honey, or a load of manure for that matter, than all the currency in the world. We often destroy the world's real wealth to create an illusion of wealth, confusing symbol and substance. -William Longgood, The Queen Must Die”

— Susan Wiggs

“The best honey comes from a source you know, and is processed without heat. Raw, unfiltered honey retains its royal jelly, bee pollen and propolis-three major sources of antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. 1 cup of locally produced, raw organic honey 1 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice Additional water, about 2 cups 2-½ cups water Ice cubes or crushed ice 1 tablespoon dried culinary lavender Combine honey and 2-½ cups of water in a saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring to dissolve the honey. When the mixture reaches a boil, stir in the lavender and remove from heat. Let the mixture steep for 20 minutes. Strain the lavender from the liquid, then add the fresh lemon juice and an additional 2 cups of water. Use sparkling water if you wish. Pour into glasses full of ice and serve, garnished with a sprig of lavender or mint. [Source: Original]”

— Susan Wiggs

“What drew her into O'Riley's like a bee to honey was the six-foot, broad-shouldered, dark eyes, dark smile of Finn O'Riley himself.”

— Jill Shalvis

“If a queen bee were crossed with a Friesian bull, would not the land flow with milk and honey?”

— Oliver St. John

“This (presidential) system will not bear any resemblance to dictatorships under the same name in Africa and Asia, (It) will be unique to Turkey, it will be like a bee making honey, taking something from every flower and giving us a taste of a truly different honey.”

— Recep Tayyip Erdogan

“Rosanne Daryl Thomas's tale of her enchantment by bees is a delight to read. It also contains close observations of the natural world, tales of failure and triumph with the hives, and a stellar cast of characters that includes her daughter, their cats, the hapless Farmer Tom, Pete the crossing guard, and, most important, the Bee Master. Every word tastes sweet as honey.”

— Janet Lembke

“These great improvements of modern times are blessings or curses on us, just in the same ratio as the mental, moral, and religious rule over the animal; or the animal propensities of our nature predominate over the intellectual and moral. The spider elaborates poison from the same flower, in which the bee finds materials out of which she manufactures honey.”

— Harriot Kezia Hunt

“The bee, though it finds every rose has a thorn, comes back loaded with honey from his rambles; and why should not other tourists do the same?”

— Thomas Chandler Haliburton

“When was ever honey made with one bee in a hive?”

— Thomas Hood

“The bee that hath honey in her mouth hath a sting in her tail.”

— John Lyly

“Honey is sweet, "and so is knowledge, but knowledge is like the bee that made that sweet honey, you have to chase it through the pages of a book." (taken from "Thank you, Mr. Falker" )”

— Patricia Polacco

“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

“To a lesser extent (they like) the whites and reds, but blues, yellows and oranges are the main bee flowers. Although there are very good white bee flowers - white sweet clover is the best honey plant in the world.”

— Chip Taylor

“It is the goodly outside that sin puts on which tempteth to destruction. It has been said that sin is like the bee, with honey in its mouth, but a sting in its tail.”

— Hosea Ballou

“No longer a stranger, you listen all day to these crazy love-words. Like a bee you fill hundreds of homes with honey, though yours is a long flight from here.”

— Rumi

“Every epigram should resemble a bee; it should have sting, honey, and brevity.”

— Martial

“No honey for me, if it comes with a bee.”

— Sappho

“So on one hand, honey is an amazingly sophisticated and efficient food source. On the other hand, it's bee backwash.”

— Alton Brown

“It takes a bee to get the honey out”

— Arthur Guiterman

“Thomas Edison reads not for entertainment but to increase his store of knowledge. He sucks in information as eagerly as the bee sucks honey from flowers. The whole world, so to speak, pours its wisdom into his mind. He regards it as a criminal waste of time to go through the slow and painful ordeal of ascertaining things for one's self if these same things have already been ascertained and made available by others. In Edison's mind knowledge is power.”

— B.C. Forbes

“The flowers are full of honey, but only the bee finds out the sweetness.”

— Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

“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

“Behold, I am weary of my wisdom,
like a bee that has gathered too much honey;
I need hands outstretched to receive it.”

— Friedrich Nietzsche

“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

“The honey is sweet, but the Bee stings.”

— George Herbert

“As the bee collecteth honey with great zest, so the fool collecteth wealth.”

— Kabir

“The world is plentiful with honey, but only the humble bee can collect it.”

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

“So long as the bee is outside the petals of the lily, and has not tasted the sweetness of its honey, it hovers around the flower emitting the buzzing sound; but when it is inside the flower, it noiselessly drinks the nectar. So long as a man quarrels and disputes about doctrines and dogmas, he has not tasted the nectar of true faith; when he has tasted it, he becomes quiet and full of peace.”

— Ramakrishna

“Man had in the beginning no power of analysis or synthesis approaching that of the spider, or even of the honey-bee; he had acute sensibility to the higher forces. Fire taught him secrets that no other animal could learn; running water probably taught him even more, especially in his first lessons of mechanics; the animals helped to educate him, trusting themselves into his hands merely for the sake of their food, and carrying his burdens or supplying his clothing; the grasses and grains were academies of study.”

— Henry Adams

“The spider-mind acquires a faculty of memory, and, with it, a singular skill of analysis and synthesis, taking apart and putting together in different relations the meshes of its trap. Man had in the beginning no power of analysis or synthesis approaching that of the spider, or even of the honey-bee; but he had acute sensibility to the higher forces.”

— Henry Adams

“Like the bee gathering honey from the different flowers, the wise person
accepts the essence of the different scriptures and sees only the good in all religions.”

— Mahatma Gandhi