Poet Quotes - Page 21

• Pain makes hens and poets cackle.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Pain, Creativity, Hens

  Friedrich Nietzsche (1977). “The Portable Nietzsche”, p.246, Penguin

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• From not the gravest of Divines,
  Accept for once some serious Lines.

  Jonathan Swift

  Poetry, Lines, Serious

  Jonathan Swift, John Hawkesworth (1754). “The Works of Jonathan Swift: Accurately Revised in Twelve Volumes, Adorned with Copper-plates. With Some Account of the Author's Life and Notes, Historical and Explanatory”, p.142

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• Poetry has become the higher algebra of metaphors.

  Jose Ortega y Gasset

  Poetry, Metaphor, Algebra

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• Time has nothing to do with the matter.

  Moliere

  Poetry, Effort, Criticism

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• One can be well-bred and write bad poetry

  Moliere

  Writing, Poetry, Criticism

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• If one doubts whether Grecian valor and patriotism are not a fiction of the poets, he may go to Athens and see still upon the walls of the temple of Minerva the circular marks made by the shields taken from the enemy in the Persian war, which were suspended there. We have not far to seek for living and unquestionable evidence. The very dust takes shape and confirms some story which we had read.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Wall, War, Taken

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.178, Xist Publishing

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• Some poems are for holidays only. They are polished and sweet, but it is the sweetness of sugar, and not such as toil gives to sour bread. The breath with which the poet utters his verse must be that by which he lives.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Sweet, Integrity, Holiday

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.243, Xist Publishing

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• Our taste is too delicate and particular. It says nay to the poet's work, but never yea to his hope.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Poetry, Criticism, Taste

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1056, Delphi Classics

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• What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,--for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Philosophy, Reading, Men

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.64, Xist Publishing

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• A true poem is distinguished not so much by a felicitous expression, or any thought it suggests, as by the atmosphere which surrounds it. Most have beauty of outline merely, and are striking as the form and bearing of a stranger; but true verses come toward us indistinctly, as the very breath of all friendliness, and envelop us in their spirit and fragrance.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Beauty, Expression, Poetry

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.279, Delphi Classics

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• It would be worth the while to select our reading, for books are the society we keep; to read only the serenely true; never statistics, nor fiction, nor news, nor reports, nor periodicals, but only great poems, and when they failed, read them again, or perchance write more. Instead of other sacrifice, we might offer up our perfect (teleia) thoughts to the gods daily, in hymns or psalms. For we should be at the helm at least once a day.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Book, Reading, Writing

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.83, Delphi Classics

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• The poet's body even is not fed like other men's, but he sometimes tastes the genuine nectar and ambrosia of the gods, and lives adivine life. By the healthful and invigorating thrills of inspiration his life is preserved to a serene old age.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Men, Serenity

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.243, Xist Publishing

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• Poetry is the mysticism of mankind.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Poetry, Mankind, Mysticism

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Quotable Thoreau: An A to Z Glossary of Inspiring Quotations from Henry David Thoreau”, p.77, BookBaby

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• What a contrast between the stern and desolate poetry of Ossian, and that of Chaucer, and even of Shakespeare and Milton, much more of Dryden, and Pope, and Gray! Our summer of English poetry, like the Greek and Latin before it, seems well advanced towards its fall, and laden with the fruit and foliage of the season, with bright autumnal tints, but soon the winter will scatter its myriad clustering and shading leaves, and leave only a few desolate and fibrous boughs to sustain the snow and rime, and creak in the blasts of age.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Summer, Latin, Fall

  Henry David Thoreau (2016). “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, p.261, Xist Publishing

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• Therefore we value the poet. All the argument and all the wisdom is not in the encyclopedia, or the treatise on metaphysics, or the Body of Divinity, but in the sonnet or the play.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Play, Poetry, Body

  Ralph Waldo Emerson, David Mikics (2012). “The Annotated Emerson”, p.193, Harvard University Press

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• We may climb into the thin and cold realm of pure geometry and lifeless science, or sink into that of sensation. Between these extremes is the equator of life, of thought, or spirit, or poetry,--a narrow belt.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Science, Poetry, May

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1983). “Essays and Lectures”, p.480, Library of America

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• Great is the art,
  Great be the manners, of the bard.
  He shall not his brain encumber
  With the coil of rhythm and number;
  But, leaving rule and pale forethought,
  He shall aye climb
  For his rhyme.
  "Pass in, pass in," the angels say

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Art, Angel, Numbers

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.4360, Delphi Classics

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• For, whom the Muses smile upon,
  And touch with soft persuasion,
  His words like a storm-wind can bring
  Terror and beauty on their wing;
  In his every syllable
  Lurketh nature veritable.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Wind, Wings, Poetry

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2007). “Poems”, p.137, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Men consort in camp and town
  But the poet dwells alone.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Inspirational, Men, Poetry

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2015). “Poems”, p.152, The Floating Press

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• The poet needs a ground in popular tradition on which he may work, and which, again, may restrain his art within the due temperance. It holds him to the people, supplies a foundation for his edifice; and, in furnishing so much work done to his hand, leaves him at leisure, and in full strength for the audacities of his imagination.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Art, Creativity, Hands

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.1619, Delphi Classics

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• A poet is no rattlebrain, saying what comes uppermost, and, because he says every thing, saying, at last, something good; but a heart in unison with his time and country. There is nothing whimsical or fantastic in his production, but sweet and sad earnest, freighted with the weightiest convictions, and pointed with the most determined aim which any man or class knows of in his times.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Country, Sweet, Heart

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2015). “Emerson's Essays: Top Essays”, p.110, 谷月社

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• The world still wants its poet-priest, a reconciler, who shall not trifle with Shakspeare the player, nor shall grope in graves with Swedenborg the mourner; but who shall see, speak, and act, with equal inspiration. For knowledge will brighten the sunshine; right is more beautiful than private affection; and love is compatible with universal wisdom.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Beautiful, Inspiration, Sunshine

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1850). “Representative Men: Seven Lectures”, p.162

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• There is, in all great poets, a wisdom of humanity which is superior to any talents they exercise.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Exercise, Poetry, Humanity

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2011). “Natural Abundance: Ralph Waldo Emerson's Guide to Prosperity”, p.184, Simon and Schuster

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• For this present, hard
  Is the fortune of the bard,
  Born out of time;
  All his accomplishment,
  From Nature's utmost treasure spent,
  Booteth not him.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Accomplishment, Poetry, Treasure

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2007). “Poems”, p.44, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Social questions are too sectional, too topical, too temporal to move a man to the mighty effort which is needed to produce greatpoetry. Prison reform may nerve Charles Reade to produce an effective and businesslike prose melodrama; but it could never produce Hamlet, Faust, or Peer Gynt.

  George Bernard Shaw

  Moving, Men, Effort

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