Who is sting?

Famous quotes containing the word sting:

“Marriage has, for its share, usefulness, justice, honour, and constancy; a stale but more durable pleasure. Love is grounded on pleasure alone, and it is indeed more gratifying to the senses, keener and more acute; a pleasure stirred and kept alive by difficulties. There must be a sting and a smart in it. It ceases to be love if it has no shafts and no fire.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)

“Thou thyself hast been a libertine,
As sensual as the brutish sting itself.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

“Then, welcome each rebuff
That turns earth’s smoothness rough,
Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go!”
—Robert Browning (1812–1889)