Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
To justify God's ways to man.
Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure.
White in the moon the long road lies.
Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
I, a stranger and afraid, in a world I never made.
The mortal sickness of a mind too unhappy to be kind.
I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.
Poetry is not the thing said, but the way of saying it.
When the journey's over/There'll be time enough to sleep.
The fairies break their dances And leave the printed lawn.
Earth and high heaven are fixed of old and founded strong.
I do not choose the right word, I get rid of the wrong one.
Ten thousand times I've done my best and all's to do again.
Malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man.
I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat.
The house of delusions is cheap to build but drafty to live in.
And malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man.
Now, of my threescore years and ten, Twenty will not come again.
Oh, 'tis jesting, dancing, drinking Spins the heavy world around.
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now Is hung with bloom along the bough.
Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink for fellows whom it hurts to think.
And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.
Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill
All knowledge is precious whether or not it serves the slightest human use.
Hope lies to mortals And most believe her, But man's deceiver Was never mine.
The average man, if he meddles with criticism at all, is a conservative critic.
Tomorrow, more's the pity, Away we both must hie, To air the ditty and to earth I.
Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, and we were young.
Some men are more interesting than their books but my book is more interesting than its man.
If a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.
Stone, steel, dominions pass, Faith too, no wonder; So leave alone the grass That I am under.
All knots that lovers tie Are tied to sever. Here shall your sweetheart lie, Untrue for ever.
His folly has not fellow Beneath the blue of day That gives to man or woman His heart and soul away.
Nature, not content with denying him the ability to think, has endowed him with the ability to write.
The rainy Pleiads wester Orion plunges prone, And midnight strikes and hastens, And I lie down alone.
A moment's thought would have shown him. But a moment is a long time, and thought is a painful process.
In every American there is an air of incorrigible innocence, which seems to conceal a diabolical cunning.
With rue my heart is laden For golden friends I had, For many a rose-lipped maiden And many a lightfoot lad.
This is for all ill-treated fellows Unborn and unbegot, For them to read when they're in trouble And I am not.
Three minutes thought would suffice to find this out; but thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time.
They carry back bright to the coiner the mintage of man,The lads that will die in their glory and never be old.
And how am I to face the odds Of man's bedevilment and God's? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.
That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, the happy highways where I went and cannot come again.
They say my verse is sad: no wonder; Its narrow measure spans Tears of eternity, and sorrow, Not mine. but man's.
Good religious poetry... is likely to be most justly appreciated and most discriminately relished by the undevout.
We now to peace and darkness And earth and thee restore Thy creature that thou madest And wilt cast forth no more.
Give crowns and pounds and guineas But not your heart away; Give pearls away and rubies, But keep your fancy free.
There, by the starlit fences The wanderer halts and hears My soul that lingers sighing About the glimmering weirs.
But men at whiles are sober And think by fits and starts. And if they think, they fasten Their hands upon their hearts
June suns, you cannot store them To warm the winter's cold, The lad that hopes for heaven Shall fill his mouth with mould.