We have done with Hope and Honour. we are lost to Love and Truth, We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung; And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth. God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that women possess a dangerous strength or cunning that surpasses men, especially in the context of survival and instinctive behavior.
Rudyard Kipling's quote reflects a profound observation about the inherent qualities and capabilities of females in nature and society. It implies that while males may often be seen as stronger in physical terms, females can wield a more lethal form of power, whether through intelligence, resourcefulness, or emotional depth. This perspective can highlight the complexities of gender roles and the underestimated potential of women in various realms of life.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about gender roles and societal expectations, this quote could emphasize the underestimated power of women.
More from Rudyard Kipling
All quotes βHumble because of knowledge; mighty by sacrifice.
Hear and attend and listen; for this is what befell and be-happened and became and was, O my Best Beloved, when the Tame animals were wild. The dog was wild, and the Horse was wild, and the Cow was wild, and the Sheep was wild, and the Pig was wild -as wild as wild could be - and they walked in the Wet Wild Woods by their wild lones. But the wildest of all the wild animals was the Cat. He walked by himself and all places were alike to him
I keep six honest serving men.
And when your back stops aching and your hands begin to harden, You will find yourself a partner in the Glory of the Garden.
Savings represent much more than mere money value. They are the proof that the saver is worth something in himself. Any fool can waste; any fool can muddle; but it takes something more of a man to save and the more he saves the more of a man he makes of himself. Waste and extravagance unsettle a man's mind for every crisis; thrift, which means some form of self-restraint, steadies it.
Similar quotes
Everything has changed except the way man thinks (when the hydrogen bomb was exploded)
We have found that where science has progressed the farthest, the mind has but regained from nature that which the mind put into nature.
Serial or sex murder, like fetishism, is a perversion of male intelligence. It is a criminal abstraction, masculine in its deranged egotism and orderliness. It is the asocial equivalent of philosophy, mathematics, and music. There is no female Mozart because there is no female Jack the Ripper.
To shift the structure of a sentence alters the meaning of that sentence, as definitely and inflexibly as the position of a camera alters the meaning of the object photographed.
Day by day, we are becoming what we shall be eternally. The spirit who convicts us is also the spirit who consoles.
All human actions are equivalent... and all are on principle doomed to failure.