Thomas de Quincey Quotes - Page 2

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• As is the inventor of murder, and the father of art, Cain must have been a man of first-rate genius.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Art, Father, Philosophy

  Thomas De Quincey, James Thomas Fields (1851). “De Quincey's Writings: Miscellaneous essays. 1851”, p.24

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• here was the secret of happiness, about which philosophers had disputed for so many ages, at once discovered; happiness might now be bought for a penny, and carried in the waistcoat-pocket; portable ecstasies might be had corked up in a pint-bottle; and peace of mind could be sent down by the mail.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Mind, Secret, Age

  Thomas De Quincey (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Thomas De Quincey (Illustrated)”, p.227, Delphi Classics

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• A great scholar, in the highest sense of the term, is not one who depends simply on an infinite memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of combination; bringing together from the four winds, like the Angel of the Resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the unity of breathing life.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Memories, Angel, Men

  Thomas De Quincey (1892). “Joan of Arc: And Other Selections from Thomas De Quincey. Joan of Arc. The English mail coach (abridged).. Levana and our ladies of sorrow. Dinner, real and reputed (abridged).. I.. II.. III.. IV.”

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• Call for the grandest of all earthly spectacles, what is that? It is the sun going to his rest.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Sun, Spectacles

  Thomas De Quincey (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Thomas De Quincey (Illustrated)”, p.159, Delphi Classics

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• The peace of nature and of the innocent creatures of god seems to be secure and deep, only so long as the presence of man and his restless and unquiet spirit are not there to trouble its sanctity.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Peace, Nature, Men

  Thomas De Quincey (2016). “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater”, p.12, Open Road Media

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• A promise is binding in the inverse ratio of the numbers to whom it is made.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Numbers, Promise, Ratios

  Thomas De Quincey (2015). “The Confessions of an English Opium-Eater”, p.81, Sheba Blake Publishing

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• Thou hast the keys of Paradise, oh, just, subtle, and mighty opium!

  Thomas de Quincey

  Keys, Drug, Paradise

  'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' (1822) pt. 2 'The Pleasures of Opium'

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• War has a deeper and more ineffable relation to hidden grandeurs in man than has yet been deciphered.

  Thomas de Quincey

  War, Men, Ineffable

  Thomas De Quincey (1863). “De Quincey's Works ...: Miscellanies: chiefly narrative”, p.286

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• Everlasting farewells! and again, and yet again reverberated everlasting farewells!

  Thomas de Quincey

  Farewell, Everlasting

  'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' (1822) pt. 3 'The Pains of Opium'

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• All is finite in the present; and even that finite is infinite in it velocity of flight towards death. But in God there is nothing finite...Upon a night of earthquake he builds a thousand years of pleasant habitations for man. Upon the sorrow of an infant he raises oftentimes from human intellects glorious vintages that could not else have been.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Night, Men, Years

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• So, then, Oxford Street, stonyhearted stepmother, thou that listenest to the sighs of orphans, and drinkest the tears of children, at length I was dismissed from thee.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Children, Oxford, Tears

  'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' (1822) pt. 1

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• Enough if every age produce two or three critics of this esoteric class, with here and there a reader to understand them.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Class, Two, Age

  Thomas De Quincey (1873). “The Works of Thomas De Quincey, "The English Opium Eater": Including All His Contributions to Periodical Literature”, p.237

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• The pulpit style of Germany has been always rustically negligent, or bristling with pedantry.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Style, Germany, Pulpit

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• Flowers... that are so pathetic in their beauty, frail as the clouds, and in their coloring as gorgeous as the heavens, had through thousands of years been the heritage of children - honored as the jewelry of God only by them - when suddenly the voice of Christianity, counter-signing the voice of infancy, raised them to a grandeur transcending the Hebrew throne, although founded by God himself, and pronounced Solomon in all his glory not to be arrayed like one of these.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Children, Flower, Clouds

  "Confessions of an English Opium-Eater". Book by Thomas de Quincey, 1821.

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• Kings should disdain to die, and only disappear.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Kings, Disappear, Should

  Thomas De Quincey (1826). “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. By T. De Quincey”, p.90

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• Grief even in a child hates the light and shrinks from human eyes.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Children, Hate, Grief

  Thomas De Quincey, Grevel Lindop (1998). “The Confessions of an English Opium-Eater: And Other Writings”, p.103, Oxford Paperbacks

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• The whole body of the arts and sciences composes one vast machinery for the irritation and development of the human intellect.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Art, Irritation, Development

  Thomas De Quincey, James Thomas Fields (1854). “De Quincey's Writings: Theological essays and other papers. 1854”, p.94

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• Dyspepsy is the ruin of most things: empires, expeditions, and everything else.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Empires, Ruins, Expeditions

  Autograph letter from De Quincey addressed to J.A. Hessey, December 3, 1823.

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• There is first the literature of KNOWLEDGE, and secondly, the literature of POWER. The function of the first is -- to teach; the function of the second is -- to move.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Moving, Literature, Firsts

  Thomas De Quincey (1862). “Leaders in literature”, p.5

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• The burden of the incommunicable.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Burden

  'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' (1822) pt. 1

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• Out of the ruined lodge and forgotten mansion, bowers that are trodden under foot, and pleasure-houses that are dust, the poet calls up a palingenesis.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Dust, Feet, Poetry

  Thomas De Quincey (1853). “Essays on the Poets: And Other English Writers”, p.12, Boston, Ticknor, Reed, and Fields

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• Often one's dear friend talks something which one scruples to call rigmarole.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Scruples, Dear Friend, Dear

  Thomas De Quincey, James Thomas Fields (1859). “De Quincey's Writings: Historical and critical essays. 1853”, p.278

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• Fierce sectarianism breeds fierce latitudinarianism.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Fierce, Sectarianism

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• It was a Sunday afternoon, wet and cheerless; and a duller spectacle this earth of ours has not to show than a rainy Sunday in London.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Sunday, Afternoon, Earth

  'Confessions of an English Opium Eater' (1822) pt. 2 'The Pleasures of Opium'

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• It is an impressive truth that sometimes in the very lowest forms of duty, less than which would rank a man as a villain, there is, nevertheless the sublimest ascent of self-sacrifice. To do less would class you as an object of eternal scorn, to do so much presumes the grandeur of heroism.

  Thomas de Quincey

  Sacrifice, Men, Self

  Thomas De Quincey (1854). “De Quincey's works”, p.125

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