"Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight, and burned is Apollo's laurel-bough, that sometime grew within this learned man."
— Christopher Marlowe
Cut Is The Branch That Might
Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight, and burned is Apollo's laurel-bough, that sometime grew within this learned man.
About this quote
Spoken by the Chorus in the Epilogue of Doctor Faustus (c. 1592), summarising Faustus's fall. The "branch" is a natural metaphor for human potential cut short; Apollo's laurel bough refers to the god of poetry and learning — Faustus had described himself as "conjuror laureate," but his mastery was used for forbidden arts rather than true scholarship. The Epilogue carries a double warning: against overreaching ambition and against trading genuine intellectual achievement for cheap spectacle.
Source
Doctor Faustus, c. 1592