There’s a treasure trove of wise messages you can find from this collection of the best dove quotes.
So, if you’re in need of that little push to remind you of the beauty this world has to offer, be sure you add this collection to your must-reads of the day.
Doves are symbols of many things—purity, beauty, peace, and also grief. At the same time, they also appear in the symbolism of different religions like Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and even Paganism.
There’s so much to find out and learn when it comes to these gentle, white birds.
Check out this list with the best dove quotes.
And make sure to read our collection of bird quotes and duck quotes.
Best Dove Quotes
1. “Great ideas come into the world as gently as doves.” – Albert Camus
2. “The more bombers, the less room for doves of peace.” – Nikita Khrushchev
3. “Love is the dove of peace, the spirit of brotherhood. It is tenderness and compassion, forgiveness and tolerance.” – Wilferd Peterson
4. “Expand thy wings, celestial dove. Brood o’er our nature’s night, on our disordered spirits move, and let there now be light.” – Charles Wesley
5. “I say love, and the world populates itself with doves.” – Pablo Neruda
6. “As the hawk is, won’t to pursue the trembling doves.” – Ovid
7. “When angels visit us, we do not hear the rustle of wings, nor feel the feathery touch of the breast of a dove; but we know their presence by the love they create in our hearts.” – Mary Baker Eddy
8. “A song fluttered down in the form of a dove, and it bore me a message, the one word—love!” – Paul Laurence Dunbar
9. “Those doves below, the ones utterly cared for, never endangered ones, cannot know tenderness.” – Rainer Maria Rilke
Famous Dove Quotes
10. “Be wise as a serpent and wary as a dove!” – Mark Twain
11. “Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly, when the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky; not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves, when thro’ the clouds he drives the trembling doves.” – Alexander Pope
12. “Soft on the neck of either dove, love’s hands let slip the reins; and while we look for light of love, love’s twilight wanes.” – Oksana Rus
13. “People want you to be happy. Don’t keep serving them your pain! If you could untie your wings and free your soul of jealousy, you and everyone around you would fly up like doves.” – Rumi
14. “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” – Anonymous
15. “A dove struggling in a storm grows stronger than an eagle soaring in sunshine.” – Matshona Dhliwayo
16. “We cannot approach beauty. Its nature is like opaline doves’-neck lustres, hovering and evanescent. Herein it resembles the most excellent things, which all have this rainbow character, defying all attempts at appropriation and use.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
17. “D’Artagnan had time to reflect that women—those gentle doves—treat one another more cruelly than bears and tigers.” – Alexandre Dumas
18. “Common hypocrites pass themselves off as doves; political and literary hypocrites pose as eagles. But don’t be fooled by their eagle-like appearance. These are not eagles, but rats or dogs.” – Anton Chekhov
19. “I heard the waves tumbling in a chorus of doves, inviting me to take part in their vision—a vision from beyond.” – Gina Marinello-Sweeney
Dove Quotes on Love
20. “We must combine the toughness of the serpent with the softness of the dove, a tough mind and a tender heart.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
21. “The fountain of love is the rose and the lily, the sun and the dove.” – Heinrich Heine
22. “Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove. Dance me to the end of love.” – Leonard Cohen
23. “A dove will never nest in a burning tree, nor will love ever reside in an unforgiving heart.” – Jason Versey
24. “The new mythology of love was that it bent to the fashion of the day, obligated to take the shape of doves, lilies, jewels. This is a lie. Love is sometimes as passionate as war.” – Brena Yovanoff
25. “Wolves and doves mate for life. I hope in the next life, I am one of the two.” – Amanda Mosher
26. “My name, Paloma, means ‘dove’ in Spanish. It stands as a symbol of peace and purity.” – Paloma Picasso
27. “‘Love’ is so short of perfect rhymes that convention allows half-rhymes like ‘move.’ The alternative is a plague of doves, or a kind of poem in which the poet addresses his adoration both as ‘love’ and as ‘guv’—a perfectly decent solution once, but only once, in a while.” – James Fenton
28. “See how that pair of billing doves with open murmurs own their loves, and, heedless of censorious eyes, pursue their unpolluted joys. No fears of future want, molest the downy quiet of their nest.” – Mary Wortley Montagu
29. “Cursed is our love, as we long for each other like wounded doves with these feelings we suffocate.” – Heena Jadav Sunil
Dove Quotes on Beauty and Purity
30. “I like doves. They look so beautiful, like a woman. For me, they represent peace and love and purity. And sometimes, they’re seen as the messengers of God, so they’re important to me because I’m a Christian.” – John Woo
31. “And there were ruined castles covered with ivy—the badge of the old order, clinging to its own; and into the ivy doves dived, seeming to leave in their wake a trail of amethyst, just as a clump of bottle-green leaves is shot with purple by the knowledge that it hides violets.” – Hope Mirrlees
32.“That is the beauty of reading a meaningful quote. Just as it is with the spirit of our hearts, sometimes we must feed the doves in order to hear them sing.” – JasonVersey
33. “I saw doves and I thought they were rocks, but they were asleep. My breath made them stir, and they rocks took flight, the earth exploding, and my only thought was that I wanted you to see them, too.” – Douglas Coupland
34. “You are my song, my dark blue dream of doves, of winter’s drowsy drone, and sleighs that slow and golden go through gray blue shadows on the snow.” – Velimir Khlebnikov
35. “The simplicity of the dove denotes purity of action.” – Syncletica Of Alexandria
36. “There’s something specific about the doves’ way of living my life as a natural result of today since it’s raining.” – Inger Christensen
37. “Long before the stars died the birds began to sing, cool rippling doves, loud cherry starlings, the long lilting trills of warblers and thrushes.” – Mike Bond
38. “Your eyes are doves.” – Anonymous
39. “In the garden of humanity, there are tigers and lions, deer and doves. Deer and doves live carefully, but with beauty and joy.” – Debasish Mridha
Poetic Dove Quotes
40. “The dove, on silver pinions, winged her peaceful way.” – James Montgomery
41. “Listen, sweet dove, unto my song, and spread thy golden wings in me; hatching my tender heart so long, till it gets wings, and fly away with thee.” – George Herbert
42. “And there my little doves did sit, with feathers softly brown and glittering eyes that showed their right to general nature’s deep delight.” – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
43. “And oft, I heard the tender dove in firry woodlands making moan.” – Alfred Lord Tennyson
44. “The smallest worm will turn being trodden on, and doves will peck in safeguard of their brood.” – William Shakespeare
45. “I repaid vileness with doves.” – Pablo Neruda
46. “Love’s heralds should be thoughts, which ten times faster glide than the sun’s beams, driving back shadows over louring hills. Therefore, do nimble-pinioned doves draw love, and therefore, hath the wind-swift cupid wings.” – William Shakespeare
47. “Love can be angry with a kind of anger in which there is no gall, like the dove’s and not the ravens.” – Saint Augustine
48. “The wretch that fears to drown, will break through flames; or, in his dread of flames, will plunge in waves. When eagles are in view, the screaming doves will cower beneath the feet of man for safety.” – Colley Cibber
49. “Thus weary of the world, away she goes, and yokes her silver doves; by whose swift aid their mistress mounted through the empty skies in her light chariot quickly is conveyed; holding their course to Paphos, where their queen means to immure herself and not be seen.” – William Shakespeare
Dove Quotes on Sorrow and Pain
50. “Seagulls were the souls of dead soldiers. Owls were the souls of women. Doves were the recently departed souls of unmarried girls.” – Ruta Sepetys
51. “To all new truths, or renovation of old truths, it must be as in the ark between the destroyed and the about-to-be renovated world. The raven must be sent out before the dove, and ominous controversy must precede peace and the olive wreath.” – Samuel Taylor Coleridge
52. “I had a dove and the sweet dove died; and I have thought it died of grieving. O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied, with a silken thread of my own hands’ weaving.” – John Keats
53. “To this day, I still think ‘Lonesome Dove’ is my best part.” – Robert Duvall
54. “Don’t kill doves in the garden. You kill one and the others won’t come.” – Malala Yousafzai
55. “Mourning doves have the same misfortune that pigs have, the misfortune of being delicious.” – Alan W. Powers
56. “Soon, their tongues are down each other’s throats and doves of peace are pooping on their epaulets.” – George Saunders
57. “Rose petals, doves, and the sinister cherubs make a big reappearance, shouting, ‘Ready. Aim. Fire.’” – Anne Eliot
58. “Were floods of tears to be unloosed in tribute to my grief, the doves of Noah ne’er had roost, nor found an olive leaf.” – Marcus Tullius Cicero
59. “The harsh crack of the rifle and the limp rabbits and doves were the practical cost of the joy of those mornings.” – Sonja Yoerg
Philosophical and Deep Dove Quotes
60. “After the sharp-eyed jay and the roaring lion, peace will come on the dove’s gentle wing.” – Erin Hunter
61. “The dove loves when it quarrels; the wolf hates when it flatters.” – Augustine of Hippo
62. “No doves come from ravens’ eggs.” – Mark Oxbrow
63. “Only in the first hour of the night can I become human, while the male dove is busy with the twelve dead.” – Carl Gustav Jung
64. “As a human being, it is just my nature to enjoy and share philosophy. I do this in the same way that some birds are eagles and some doves, some flowers, lilies, and some roses.” – Alan Watts
65. “On the fences, the shiny blackbirds with red epaulets clicked their dry call. The meadowlarks sang like water, and the wild doves, concealed among the bursting leaves of the oaks, made a sound of restrained grieving.” – John Steinback
66. “It would be well, perhaps, if we were to spend more of our days and nights without any obstruction between us and the celestial bodies, if the poet did not speak so much from under a roof, or the saint dwells there so long. Birds do not sing in caves, nor do doves cherish their innocence in dovecotes.” – Henry David Thoreau
67. “Hither, thither, through the sky, turtle-doves and linnets, fly! Blackbird, thrush, and chaffinch gay, hither, thither, haste away! One and all, come, help me quick! haste ye, haste ye—pick, pick, pick!” – Jacob Grimm
68. “We say this changes and that changes. Thus, the constant violets, doves, girls, bees, and hyacinths are inconstant objects of inconstant cause in a universe of inconstancy.” – Wallace Stevens
69. “How many roads must a man walk down, before you call him a man? How many seas must a white dove sail, before she sleeps in the sand? Yes, and how many times must the cannonballs fly, before they’re forever banned?” – Bob Dylan
Dove Quotes That Are Full of Wisdom
70. “Managing is like holding a dove in your hand. Squeeze too hard and you kill it; not hard enough and it flies away.” – Tommy Lasorda
71. “Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.” – Tamora Pierce
72. “Censure acquits the raven, but pursues the dove.” – Juvenal
73. “When a dove begins to associate with crows, its feathers remain white but its heart grows black.” – Anonymous
74. “It is not in the entrails of doves that the fall of empires can be read, but in the breeding of secrets and the multiplication of lies.” – Rod Duncan
75. “Humans, no matter their color, are fragile as doves in the meat grinder of war.” – Pierce Brown
76. “Fierce eagles breed not the tender dove.” – Horace
77. “Daughter of Aphrodite, lady of the doves, goddess of love.” – Rick Riordan
78. “Sweet is every sound—sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet; myriads of rivulets hurrying thro’ the lawn, the moans of doves in immemorial elms, and murmuring of innumerable bees.” – Alfred Lord Tennyson
79. “Leave the mourning to the doves because we will never die.” – John Lack
Heartfelt Dove Quotes
80. “For nature is love, and finds haunts for true love, where nothing can hear or intrude; it hides from the eagle and joins with the dove, in beautiful green solitude.” – John Clare
81. “You don’t own art. What does that mean? We are trustees of art. Art is in transit with us. That is why an auction is a wonderful thing. You clap your hands and the objects fly away like doves and find other places where they will be protected, loved. That’s what I believe.” – Pierre Berge
82. “It seems like we’re galaxies apart, but we find hope within our heart. And how I wish I was all of the above, so I can come below and yet forget the beauty of angels which come down like a dove, and demons who love with no regret.” – Virgil Kalyana Mittata Iordache
83. “Sharp and mild, dull and keen, well known and strange, dirty and clean, where both the fool and wise are seen. All this am I, have ever been, in me dove, snake, and swine convene!” – Friedrich Nietzsche
84. “Yesterday’s gone on down the river and you can’t get it back.” – Larry McMurtry
85. “He thought of the way the doves had flown up into the sky all in a ruse, startled by gunfire, and then all he could think was that despite everything that happened, he was alive.” – Alice Hoffman
86. “The dove is my emblem.” – Thomas A. Edison
87. “Greet each man with peace, and leave each man with love. Ask yourself—one more enemy, or one more dove?” – Suzy Kassem
88. “Dove still couldn’t trust herself to speak without blubbering. But she could kiss.” – Debra Anastasia
89. “There are as many burning guitars, as there are burning doves.” – Weasel
Inspirational Dove Quotes
90. “Perhaps then, if we listen attentively, we shall hear amid the uproar of empires and nations, a faint flutter of wings, the gentle stirring of life and hope.” – Albert Camus
91. “We are single doves—wingless messengers of peace, sent without a script.” – Nanette L. Avery
92. “I wanna get rich enough in life that I can afford to release a dozen doves every time I walk into a room. You know people would be like, ‘Did you see that guy come out of the bathroom? The one with doves, it was beautiful.’” – Daniel Tosh
93. “For virtue is a light and buoyant thing, and all who live in her way fly like clouds as Isaiah says, and as doves with their young ones; but sin is a heavy affair, as another of the prophets says, sitting upon a talent of lead.” – Gregory Of Nyssa
94. “And though there were no children playing, no doves, no blue-shadowed roof tiles, I felt that the town was alive. And that if I heard only silence, it was because I was not accustomed to silence—maybe because my head was still filled with sounds and voices.” – Juan Rulfo
95. “Each morning when I arrive, the doves know me; their song rises and falls with pleasure and acceptance. It is always there, a river of sound.” – Alice Hoffman
96. “Two turtle doves will show thee where my cold ashes lie, and sadly murmuring, tell thee how in tears I did die.” – Nikolai Gogol
97. “We came like doves across the desert. In a time when there was nothing but death, we were grateful for anything, and most grateful of all when we awoke to another day.” – Alice Hoffman
98. “His characters are ravaged, beaten. They walk through infernos and emerge charred doves.” – Marisha Pessl
99. “Making those we love happy sounds innocent as a dove, but it can be as destructive as a lion.” – Florida Scott-Maxwell
Dove Quotes on Religion, Faith, and the Bible
100. “But remember when I moved in you, and the holy dove was moving too; and every breath we drew was Hallelujah.” – Leonard Cohen
101. “The lion of anger shall give place to the lamb of meekness; the raven of uncleanness shall fly before the dove of purity; the vile serpent of deceit shall be trodden under the heel of truth.” – Charles Spurgeon
102. “Lord, let me write. Leave me autistic and typing until my windows bust into a thousand silver doves and I know the poem is done.” – Buddy Wakefield
103. “Killing in the name of religion defines someone who is ignorant and actually void of religion. God does not condone terror. To kill innocent people to make a political statement is like shooting a dove to say hunting is wrong.” – Suzy Kassem
104. “The only part of Christian teachings which will be truly accepted by the Chinese people is Christ’s injunction to be ‘harmless as doves’ but ‘wise as serpents.’” – Lin Yutang
105. “The old seraph, parcel-gilded, among violets Inhaled the appointed odor, while the doves rose up like phantoms from chronologies.” – Wallace Stevens
106. “The portals are certainly closed, so the demons aren’t giving any trouble. Lots of talk about hands of friendship, doves of peace, all that sort of crap.” – Herbie Brennan
107. “As St. Paul points out, Christ never meant that we were to remain children in intelligence. On the contrary, He told us to be not only ‘as harmless as doves,’ but also ‘as wise as serpents.’ He wants a child’s heart, but a grown-up’s head.” – C.S. Lewis
108. “But for 30 years, Orthodox leaders have tipped the balance between hawks and doves, and have been in a position to determine who forms a coalition and who runs the country.” – Amos Oz
109. “When I was young, I asked my priest how to get to heaven and still protect yourself from all the evil in the world. He told me what God told His children—‘You are sheep among wolves, be wise as the serpent, yet innocent as doves.’” – Denis Lehane
110. “Oh that I had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away, and be at rest.” – Psalm 55:6
111. “Surely it could not have been a dove God had chosen to speak through, since doves could not talk.” – Gustav Flaubert
112. “And the dove came to him in the evening; and lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off. So Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.” – Genesis 8:11
113. “Wild, dark times are rumbling toward us, and the prophet who wishes to write a new apocalypse will have to invent entirely new beasts, and beasts so terrible that the ancient animal symbols of St. John will seem like cooing doves and cupids in comparison.” – Heinrich Heine
114. “And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water. And lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him. And lo, a voice from heaven saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’” – Matthew 3:16-17
Funny Dove Quotes
115. “I’m not very keen for doves or hawks. I think we need more owls.” – George Eiken
116. “In Washington, they have their hawks and doves and in Ottawa we have our parrots.” – Tommy Douglas
117. “I want to shoot doves in Argentina. Burma, of course, because no one has really been there.” – Jeremy Clarkson
118. “I tried to make a ‘When Doves Cry’ in a rap version. I used a lot of instruments and I broke it down like I thought Prince would do, and that’s the song I sent to Big Boi.” – Chuck Inglish
119. “Leigh stands there, not so much a figure to scare crows as to beckon doves.” – Paul Russell
120. “My good health is due to a soup made of white doves. It is simply wonderful as a tonic.” – Chiang Kai-shek
121. “I believe that the women were called by the Dodonaeans ‘doves’ because they were barbarians, and so they seemed to the people of Dodona to talk like birds.” – Herodotus
122. “Jeremy was hopeless. Either he’d find an equally soft-headed girl and they’d live happily ever after like two cooing doves, or he’d be eaten alive by some she-spider.” – Bonnie Dee
123. “No one’s ever very sure if doves and pigeons are the same bird or not.” – David Mitchell
124. “The sacred dove a quill did lend from her high-soaring wing.” – F. Nethersole
More Dove Quotes on Peace and Hope
125. “Peace is better than war. There’s too much glorification of war and not enough glorification of peace, and especially not enough glorification of the importance of the doves.” – Jo Walton
126. “‘Tis a fact I’ve learned all too well that words cast out in the light of day, like doves, oft come home to roost in the darkest hours.” – Kathleen E. Woodiwiss
127. “Doves oppose war on the grounds that the risks exceed the gains. War with Iraq could be very costly, possibly degenerating into urban warfare.” – Charles Krauthammer
128. “What if each child was taught from the cradle to sing the song of peace? Would the cynics not call it foolish, saying that to be gentle is to be weak? But I tell you that until we are as innocent and pure as doves, our journey will be long and the way, dark. Raise doves, not wolves.” – Joan Davis
129. “Today. I will fly in the peaceful blue sky with a flight of doves.” – Debasish Mirdha
Other Dove Quotes You’ll Love
130. “Time, as he passes us, has a dove’s wing—unsoiled, and swift, and of a silken sound.” – William Cowper
131. “I do not mean for one second to suggest that ‘White Doves at Morning’ was written with a movie deal in mind. Certainly not.” – Clive Sinclair
132. “When a man is made up wholly of the dove, without the least grain of the serpent in his composition, he becomes ridiculous in many circumstances of life, and very often discredits his best actions.” – Joseph Addison
133. “In the animal kingdom, lions, tigers and bears—the predators—have closely spaced eyes. Giraffes, rabbits, doves—the preyed upon—have eyes more widely spaced and oriented toward the sides of their heads, because they need their peripheral vision to survive.” – Patricia Cornwell
134. “‘When Doves Cry’ came out, it sounded like nothing that was on the radio. ‘Let’s Go Crazy’ was number one on R&B stations, and there’s nothing that’s been like that on radio since.” – Prince
135. “In the animal world, no creature born to be a dove turns into a scavenger. This happens only among men.” – Victor Hugo
136. “The athletes were treated to a thunderous show that culminated in the release of twenty thousand doves. As the birds circled in panicked confusion, cannons began firing, prompting the birds to relieve themselves over the athletes. With each report, the birds let fly.” – Laura Hillenbrand
137. “But undying memories stood like sentinels in her breast. When the notes of doves, calling to each other, fell on her ear, her eyes sought the sky, and she heard a voice saying, ‘Majella!’” – Helen Hunt Jackson
138. “It’s the hour when night breaks away from the day. My dove, let me go.” – Jean Genet
139. “It takes more than one dove to make peace in the Middle East.” – Madeleine Albright
140. “One has just been sent out as a biblical dove, has found nothing green, and slips back into the darkness of the Ark.” – Franz Kafka
Did You Find Peace and Joy by Reading Through This Collection of the Best Dove Quotes?
Doves are beautiful, gentle birds. We see them in the wild, but we also see them in wedding ceremonies and burials.
It seems so ironic that doves can be both a symbol of love and death at the same time. However, this also makes sense because in weddings, we see a pure and everlasting love that a couple has for one another—which is true for doves since it’s said that they’ll have one mate for the rest of their lives. This also translates to a dove being a symbol of grief—it’s about you losing someone you love and care deeply about.
Across many different cultures, doves represent purity, gentleness, faithfulness, joy, and many more. With all your new-found information about these birds, we hope that the next time you see one, you’re reminded of all the good and positive things they represent.
Which dove quotes are your favorites? Are there any other lessons you’ve gathered from the list? If so, we’d love to hear from you! Be sure to comment down below.
