William Butler Yeats Quotes - Page 13

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• Things thought too long can be no longer thought, For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth, And ancient lineaments are blotted out.

  William Butler Yeats

  Long, Ancient, Dies

  William Butler Yeats (2000). “The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats”, p.249, Wordsworth Editions

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• What's memory but the ash That chokes our fires that have begun to sink?

  William Butler Yeats

  Memories, Fire, Ashes

  William Butler Yeats (2010). “The Collected Works of W.B. Yeats Vol II: The Plays”, p.39, Simon and Schuster

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• All art is in the last analysis an endeavor to condense as out of the flying vapor of the world an image of human perfection, and for its own and not for the art's sake.

  William Butler Yeats

  Art, Perfection, Flying

  William Butler Yeats (1957). “The variorum edition of the poems of W. B. Yeats”

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• A lonely impulse of delight

  William Butler Yeats

  Lonely, Contentment, Delight

  "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death" l. 9 (1919)

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• What can I but enumerate old themes?

  William Butler Yeats

  Theme

  William Butler Yeats (2001). “The Major Works”, p.180

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• But O, sick children of the world,
  Of all the many changing things
  In dreary dancing past us whirled,
  To the cracked tune that Chronos sings,
  Words alone are certain good.

  William Butler Yeats

  Time, Children, Past

  William Butler Yeats (2015). “When You Are Old: Early Poems, Plays, and Fairy Tales”, p.142, Penguin

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• I whispered, 'I am too young,' and then, 'I am old enough'; wherefore I threw a penny to find out if I might love.

  William Butler Yeats

  Might, Pennies, Enough

  William Butler Yeats (2000). “The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats”, p.79, Wordsworth Editions

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• The women take so little stock
  In what I do or say
  They'd sooner leave their cosseting
  To hear a jackass bray.

  William Butler Yeats

  Women, Littles, Jackasses

  William Butler Yeats (1962). “Poems of William Butler Yeats”, p.14, Hayes Barton Press

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• For how can you compete Being honour bred, with one Who, were it proved he lies, Were neither shamed in his own Nor in his neighbour's eyes?

  William Butler Yeats

  Lying, Eye, Atheism

  William Butler Yeats (2000). “The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats”, p.87, Wordsworth Editions

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• Florence Farr once said to me, If we could say to ourselves, with sincerity, 'this passing moment is as good as any I shall ever know,' we could die upon the instant and be united with God.

  William Butler Yeats

  Passing Moments, Florence, Sincerity

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• Everything that man esteems Endures a moment or a day. Love's pleasure drives his love away, The painter's brush consumes his dreams.

  William Butler Yeats

  Dream, Men, His Love

  William Butler Yeats (2008). “COLLECTED POEMS OF W.B. YEATS”, p.527, Simon and Schuster

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• Never to have lived is best, ancient writers say. Never to have drawn the breath of life, never to have looked into the eye of day; The second best's a gay goodnight and quickly turn away.

  William Butler Yeats

  Life, Eye, Gay

  'From Oedipus at Colonus'.

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• Poetry and music I have banished,
  But the stupidity
  Of root, shoot, blossom or clay
  Makes no demand.
  I bend my body to the spade
  Or grope with a dirty hand.

  William Butler Yeats

  Music, Dirty, Roots

  William Butler Yeats (1997). “The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats: Volume I: The Poems, 2nd Edition”, p.325, Simon and Schuster

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• Tis the eternal law,
  That first in beauty should be first in might.

  William Butler Yeats

  Beauty, Law, Might

  7 Copy quote

• Many ingenious lovely things are gone / That seemed sheer miracle to the multitude.

  William Butler Yeats

  Miracle, Lovely, Gone

  William Butler Yeats (1997). “The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats: Volume I: The Poems, 2nd Edition”, p.210, Simon and Schuster

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• I can forgive even that wrong of wrongs,
  Those undreamt accidents that have made me
  Seeing that Fame has perished this long while,
  Being but a part of ancient ceremony
  Notorious, till all my priceless things
  Are but a post the passing dogs defile.

  William Butler Yeats

  Forgiveness, Dog, Long

  William Butler Yeats (1931). “Later Poems”, p.96, Library of Alexandria

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• Dream, dream, for this is also sooth.

  William Butler Yeats

  Dream

  William Butler Yeats (1962). “Poems of William Butler Yeats”, p.176, Hayes Barton Press

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• Fair and foul are near of kin And fair needs foul," I cried. "My friends are gone, but that's a truth Nor grave nor bed denied."

  William Butler Yeats

  Friendship, Truth, Bed

  William Butler Yeats (2000). “The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats”, p.221, Wordsworth Editions

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• The things a man has heard and seen are threads of life, and if he pull them carefully from the confused distaff of memory, any who will can weave them into whatever garments of belief please them best. I too have woven my garment like another, but I shall try to keep warm in it, and shall be well content if it do not unbecome me.

  William Butler Yeats

  Memories, Confused, Men

  William Butler Yeats (2015). “When You Are Old: Early Poems, Plays, and Fairy Tales”, p.222, Penguin

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• We poets would die of loneliness but for women, and we choose our men friends that we may have somebody to talk about women with. Letter to Olivia Shakespeare, 1936

  William Butler Yeats

  Friendship, Death, Loneliness

  4 Copy quote

• Somewhere beyond the curtain Of distorting days Lives that lonely thing That shone before these eyes Targeted, trod like Spring.

  William Butler Yeats

  Life, Lonely, Spring

  William Butler Yeats (1997). “The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats: Volume I: The Poems, 2nd Edition”, p.257, Simon and Schuster

  4 Copy quote

• Civilisation is hooped together, brought
  Under a rule, under the semblance of peace
  By manifold illusion.

  William Butler Yeats

  Civilization, Together, Uprooting

  William Butler Yeats (2011). “The Yeats Reader, Revised Edition: A Portable Compendium of Poetry, Drama, and Prose”, p.215, Simon and Schuster

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• That is no country for old men. The young In one another's arms, birds in the trees - Those dying generations-at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten, born, and dies. Caught in that sensual music all neglect Monuments of unaging intellect.

  William Butler Yeats

  Death, Summer, Country

  "Sailing to Byzantium" l. 1 (1928)

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• I am of a healthy long lived race, and our minds improve with age.

  William Butler Yeats

  Birthday, Race, Long

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• It's certain there are trout somewhere - And maybe I shall take a trout - but I do not seem to care.

  William Butler Yeats

  Lakes, Sea, Fishing

  William Butler Yeats (2000). “The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats”, p.91, Wordsworth Editions

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