Quotes to inspire and reflect

What is the end of fame? ’tis but to fill A certain portion of uncertain paper: Some liken it to climbing up a hill, Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in vapor.

There’s nought, no doubt, so much the spirit calms As rum and true religion.

Pleasure’s a sin, and sometimes sin’s a pleasure.

Man’s love is of man’s life a thing apart, ’Tis woman’s whole existence.

Sweet is revenge—especially to women.

’Tis sweet to hear the watchdog’s honest bark Bay deep-mouth’d welcome as we draw near home; ’Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark Our coming, and look brighter when we come.

Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded That all the Apostles would have done as they did.

A little still she strove, and much repented, And whispering “I will ne’er consent”—consented.

What men call gallantry, and gods adultery, Is much more common where the climate’s sultry.

Her stature tall—I hate a dumpy woman.

But—Oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual, Inform us truly, have they not henpeck’d you all?

[Of Samuel Taylor Coleridge:] I wish he would explain his explanation.

I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, Which melts like kisses from a female mouth.

Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal truth, The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.

My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here’s a double health to thee! Here’s a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And, whatever sky’s above me, Here’s a heart for every fate.

So we’ll go no more a-roving So late into the night, Though the heart be still as loving, And the moon be still as bright. For the sword outwears its sheath, And the soul wears out the breast, And the heart must pause to breathe, And love itself have rest. Though the night was made for loving, And the day returns too soon, Yet we’ll go no more a-roving By the light of the moon.

Though the day of my destiny’s over, And the star of my fate hath declined.

I had a dream which was not all a dream.

A light broke in upon my brain— It was the carol of a bird; It ceased, and then it came again, The sweetest song ear ever heard.

There be none of Beauty’s daughters With a magic like thee; And like music on the waters Is thy sweet voice to me.

Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind! Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art.

Sighing that Nature form’d but one such man, And broke the die, in molding Sheridan.

Fare thee well! and if forever, Still forever, fare thee well.

The glory and the nothing of a name.

There’s not a joy the world can give like that it takes away, When the glow of early thought declines in feeling’s dull decay.

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

She walks in beauty, like the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that’s best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes: Thus mellow’d to that tender light Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Lord of himself—that heritage of woe.

The Cincinnatus of the West, Whom envy dared not hate, Bequeathed the name of Washington To make man blush there was but one!

Mark! where his carnage and his conquests cease! He makes a solitude, and calls it—peace!

Such hath it been—shall be—beneath the sun The many still must labor for the one.

I awoke one morning and found myself famous.

I die—but first I have possess’d, And come what may, I have been bless’d.

Dark-heaving—boundless, endless, and sublime— The image of Eternity.

And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy I wanton’d with thy breakers.

Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow— Such as creation’s dawn beheld, thou rollest now.

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty’s form Glasses itself in tempests.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean—roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; Man marks the earth with ruin—his control Stops with the shore.

He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknell’d, uncoffin’d, and unknown.

Oh! that the desert were my dwelling place.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more.

Butcher’d to make a Roman holiday!

“While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall; And when Rome falls—the world.” 5

Of its own beauty is the mind diseased.

Alas! our young affections run to waste, Or water but the desert.

Yet, Freedom! yet thy banner, torn, but flying, Streams like the thunderstorm against the wind.

O Rome! my country! city of the soul!