“A day may sink or save a realm.”
“Ah, Christ, that it were possible,
For one short hour to see
Te souls we loved, that they might tell us
What and where they be.”
“Ah God, for a man with heart, head, hand,
Like some of the simple great gone
Forever and ever by,
One still strong man in a blatant land,
Whatever they call him, what care I,
Aristocrat, democrat, autocrat--one
Who can rule and dare not lie.”
“‘A hundred summers! can it be?
And whither goest thou, tell me where?’
‘O seek my father’s court with me,
For there are greater wonders there.’
And o’er the hills, and far away
Beyond their utmost purple rim,
Beyond the night, across the day,
Thro’ all the world she follow’d him.”
“A lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies.”
“And on her lover’s arm she leant,
And round her waist she felt it fold,
And far across the hills they went
In that new world which is the old:
Across the hills, and far away
Beyond their utmost purple rim,
And deep into the dying day
The happy princess follow’d him.”
“And others' follies teach us not,
Nor much their wisdom teaches,
And most, of sterling worth, is what
Our own experience preaches.”
“And our spirits rushed together at the touching of the lips.”
“And out of darkness came the hands that reach thro' nature, moulding men.”
“And Thought leapt out to wed with Thought
Ere Thought could wed itself with Speech.”
“A smile abroad is often a scowl at home.”
“But every page having an ample marge,
And every marge enclosing in the midst
A square of text that looks a little blot.”
“But light as any wind that blows
So fleetly did she stir,
The flower, she touch'd on, dipt and rose,
And turned to look at her.”
“But what am I?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light,
And with no language but a cry.”
“Cast your cares on God; that anchor holds.”
“Dear as remember'd kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feign'd
On lips that are for others.”
“Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?”
"Either sex alone is half itself."
“Faith lives in honest doubt.”
“Fancy light from Fancy caught.”
“Faith and unfaith can ne'er be equal powers;
Unfaith is aught is want of faith in all.”
“Fear
Stared in her eyes, and chalk'd her face.”
“For love reflects the thing beloved.”
“For men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.”
“God's finger touched him and he slept.”
"Guard your roving thoughts with a jealous care, for speech is but the dialer of thoughts, and every fool can plainly read in your words what is the hour of your thoughts."
”He makes no friend who never made a foe.”
“Her eyes are homes of silent prayer.”
“He that shuts love out, in turn shall be
Shut out from love, and on her threshold lie,
Howling in outer darkness.”
“I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravl'd world whose margin fades
Forever and forever when I move.”
“‘I’d sleep another hundred years,
O love, for such another kiss;’
‘O wake for ever, love,’ she hears,
‘O love, ’twas such as this and this.’
And o’er them many a sliding star,
And many a merry wind was borne,
And, stream’d thro’ many a golden bar,
The twilight melted into morn.”
"If thou shouldst never see my face again,
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of."
“I loved you, and my love had no return,
And therefore my true love has been my death.”
"I must lose myself in action, lest I wither in despair.
“In crystal vapour everywhere
Blue isles of heaven laughed between,
And far, in forest-deeps unseen,
The topmost elm-tree gather'd green
From draughts of balmy air.”
“In time there is no present,
In eternity no future,
In eternity no past.”
“Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.”
“Let knowledge grow from more to more.”
"Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change."
“Life is not as idle ore,
But iron dug from central gloom,
And heated hot with burning fears,
And dipt in baths of hissing tears,
And batter'd with the shocks of doom,
To shape and use.”
“Like a dog, he hunts in dreams.”
“Like glimpses of forgotten dreams.”
“Love is the only gold.”
“Love's arms were wreathed about the neck of Hope,
And Hope kiss'd Love, and Love drew in her breath
In that close kiss and drank her whisper'd tales.
They said that Love would die when Hope was gone.
And Love mourn'd long, and sorrow'd after Hope;
At last she sought out Memory, and they trod
The same old paths where Love had walked with Hope,
And Memory fed the soul of Love with tears.”
“Love lieth deep; Love dwells not in lip-depths.”
“Love's too precious to be lost,
A little grain shall not be spilt.”
“Many a night I saw the Peiads,
Rising thro' the mellow shade,
Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies,
Tangled in a silver braid.”
"Man dreams of fame while woman wakes to love."
“Man is the hunter; woman is his game.
The sleek and shining creatures of the chase,
We hunt them for the beauty of their skins;
They love us for it, and we ride them down.”
“Men at most differ as Heaven and Earth, but women, worst and best, as Heaven and Hell.”
“Mastering the lawless science of our law,—
That codeless myriad of precedent,
That wilderness of single instances.”
“Maybe the wildest dreams are but the needful preludes of the truth.”
“No rock so hard but that a little wave may beat admission in a thousand years.”
“Nothing in Nature is unbeautiful.”
“Once he drew
With one long kiss my whole soul thro'
My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew.”
“Read my little fable:
He that runs may read.”
“Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,—
These three alone lead life to sovereign power.”
“Seeing, I saw not, hearing not, I heard.
Tho', if I saw not, yet they told me all
So often that I spake as having seen.”
”Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, these three alone lead life to sovereign power.”
“Shall error in the round of time
Shall father Truth?”
“Shall it not be scorn to me to harp on such a moulder'd string?
I am shamed through all my nature to have lov'd so slight a thing.”
"Shape your heart to front the hour, but dream not that the hours will last."
“She is coming, my own, my sweet;
Where it ever so airy a tread,
My heart would hear her and beat,
Were it earth in an earthly bed;
My dust would hear her and beat,
Had I lain for a century dead;
Would start and tremble under her feet,
And blossom in purple and red.”
“So many worlds, so much to do,
So little done, such things to be.”
“‘Some hidden principle to move,
To put together, part and prove,
And mete the bounds of hate and love–“
"So many worlds, so much to do, so little done, such things to be."
“Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit can meet;
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.”
“Sweet is true love that is given in vain, and sweet is death that takes away pain.”
“That a lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies;
That a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with outright;
But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight.”
“The dream
Dreamed by a happy man, when the dark East,
Unseen, is brightening to his bridal morn.”
"The folly of all follies is to be love sick for a shadow."
“The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.”
“Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity:
The deep air listen'd round her as she rode,
And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear.”
“There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
She is coming, my dove, my dear;
She is coming, my life, my fate;
The red rose cries, "She is near, she is near;"
And the white rose weeps, "She is late;"
The larkspur listens, "I hear; I hear;"
And the lily whispers, "I wait."”
“There is sweet music here that softer falls
Than petals from blown roses on the grass,
Or night-dew on the still waters between walls
Of shadowy granite, in a gleaming pass;
Music that gentler on the spirit lies
Than tired eyelids upon tired eyes.”
“There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.”
“The slender acacia would not shake
One long milk-bloom on the tree;
The white lake-blossom fell into the lake
As the pimpernel dozed on the lea;
But the rose was awake all night for your sake,
Knowing your promise to me;
The lilies and roses were all awake,
They sighed for the dawn and thee.”
“The splash and stir
Of fountains spouted up and showering down
In meshes of the jasmine and the rose:
And all about us peal'd the nightingale,
Rapt in her song, and careless of the snare.”
“The white flower of a blameless life.”
“This truth within thy mind rehearse,
That in a boundless universe
Is boundless better, boundless worse.”
“‘Thou hast not gain’d a real height,
Nor art thou nearer to the light,
Because the scale is infinite.”
“'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.”
“Thy prayer was "Light--more Light"--while Time shall last
Thou sawest a glory growing on the night,
But not the shadows which that light would cast,
Till shadows vanish in the Light of Light.”
“We are ancients of the earth,
And in the morning of the times.”
“Wearing all that weight
Of learning lightly like a flower.”
“We cannot be kind to each other here for even an hour. We whisper, and hint, and chuckle and grin at our brother's shame; however you take it we men are a little breed.”
"What rights are those that dare not resist for them?"
“… Where blind and naked Ignorance
Delivers brawling judgments, unashamed,
On all things all day long.”
“Where God and Nature met in light.”
“With roses musky-breathed,
And drooping daffodilly,
And silver-leaved lily.
And ivy darkly-wreathed
I wove a crown before her,
For her I love so dearly.”
"Who is wise in love, love most, say least."
“Who loves not a false imagining, an unreal character in us; but looking through all the rubbish of our imperfections, loves in us the divine ideal of our natures - not the man that we are, but the angel that we may be.”
“Who loves not Knowledge? Who shall rail
Against her beauty? May she mix
With men and prosper! Who shall fix
Her pillars? Let her work prevail.”
“Whose faith has centre everywhere,
Nor cares to fix itself to form.”
“Words, like nature, half reveal and half conceal the soul within.”
“You shake your head. A random string
Your finer female sense offends.
Well–were it not a pleasant thing
To fall asleep with all one’s friends;
To pass with all our social ties
To silence from the paths of men;
And every hundred years to rise
And learn the world, and sleep again;
To sleep thro’ terms of mighty wars,
And wake on science grown to more,
On secrets of the brain, the stars,
As wild as aught of fairy lore;
And all that else the years will show,
The Poet-forms of stronger hours,
The vast Republics that may grow,
The Federations and the Powers;
Titanic forces taking birth
In divers seasons, divers climes;
For we are Ancients of the earth,
And in the morning of the times.”
