Scarce Quotes

• To the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.

  William Blake

  Nature, Eye, Science

  William Blake (1977). “The Portable William Blake”, p.136, Penguin

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• In Flanders fields the poppies blow.

  John McCrae

  Blow, Fields, Poppies

  "In Flanders Fields" l. 1 (1915)

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• Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
  If mankind perished utterly; And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
  Would scarcely know that we were gone.

  Sara Teasdale

  Nature, Spring, Animal

  Sara Teasdale (1920). “Flame and Shadow”, p.90, Рипол Классик

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• So Nature deals with us, and takes away Our playthings one by one, and by the hand Leads us to rest so gently, that we go, Scarce knowing if we wish to go or stay, Being too full of sleep to understand How far the unknown transcends the what we know.

  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

  Nature, Sleep, Hands

  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2012). “My Complete Poetical Works (Annotated Edition)”, p.848, Jazzybee Verlag

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• Courage and wisdom are, indeed, rarities amongst men, but of all that is good, a just man it would seem is the most scarce.

  Plutarch

  Wisdom, Men, Politics

  Plutarch (2015). “Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans: Top Biography”, p.504, 谷月社

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• Blind mouths! That scarce themselves know how to hold A sheep-hook.

  John Milton

  Sheep, Hook, Mouths

  'Lycidas' (1638) l. 114

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• When words are scarce they are seldom spent in vain.

  William Shakespeare

  Thought Provoking, Lovers Meeting, Power Of Words

  William Shakespeare, Roma Gill (1998). “Richard II”, p.23, Oxford University Press, USA

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• A good book, in the language of the book-sellers, is a salable one; in that of the curious, a scarce one; in that of men of sense, a useful and instructive one.

  Oswald Chambers

  Book, Reading, Men

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• O loss of sight, of thee I most complain! Blind among enemies, O worse than chains, dungeon or beggary, or decrepit age! Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct, and all her various objects of delight annulled, which might in part my grief have eased. Inferior to the vilest now become of man or worm; the vilest here excel me, they creep, yet see; I, dark in light, exposed to daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong, within doors, or without, still as a fool, in power of others, never in my own; scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half.

  John Milton

  Grief, Loss, Dark

  John Milton (1853). “The poetical works of John Milton, with life. Complete ed”, p.359

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• A table full of welcome makes scarce one dainty dish.

  William Shakespeare

  Tables, Welcome, Dishes

  William Shakespeare, R.A. Foakes (1962). “Arden Shakespeare: The Comedy Of Errors: Second Series”, p.42, Cengage Learning EMEA

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• I died for Beauty--but was scarce
  Adjusted in the Tomb
  When One who died for Truth, was lain
  In an adjoining Room

  Emily Dickinson

  Beauty, Death, Truth

  "I died for beauty but was scarce" l. 1 (ca. 1862)

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• We are in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us....How glorious a conversion, so complete and wholesome it is, scarce memory enough of old bondage days left as a standpoint to view it from! In this newness of life we seem to have been so always

  John Muir

  Memories, Views, Cells

  John Muir, Peter Browning (1988). “John Muir, in His Own Words: A Book of Quotations”, p.8, Great West Books

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• Let those find fault whose wit's so very small, They've need to show that they can think at all; Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow; He who would search for pearls, must dive below. Fops may have leave to level all they can; As pigmies would be glad to lop a man. Half-wits are fleas; so little and so light, We scarce could know they live, but that they bite.

  John Dryden

  Men, Thinking, Errors

  John Dryden (1870). “The Poetical Works of John Dryden”, p.433

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• I consider how little man is, yet, in his own mind, how great. He is lord and master of all things, yet scarce can command anything.

  Edmund Burke

  Men, Mind, Littles

  Edmund Burke (1852). “The Works and Correspondence Of...Edmund Burke”, p.7

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• The talent of insinuation is more useful than that of persuasion, as everybody is open to insinuation, but scarce any to persuasion.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Gossip, Talent, Persuasion

  Lord Philip Dormer Stanhope Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope Earl of Chesterfield (1855). “The Works of Lord Chesterfield: Including His Letters to His Son, Etc : to which is Prefixed, an Original Life of the Author”, p.629

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• He is not easy to describe. There is something wrong with his appearance; something displeasing, something downright detestable. I never saw a man I so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be deformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although I couldn’t specify the point. He’s an extraordinary-looking man, and yet I really can name nothing out of the way. No sir; I can make no hand of it; I can’t describe him. And it’s not want of memory; for I declare I can see him this moment.

  Robert Louis Stevenson

  Strong, Memories, Men

  Robert Louis Stevenson “Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde”, Lulu.com

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• A good laugh is a mighty good thing, and rather too scarce a good thing; the more's the pity. So, if any one man, in his own proper person, afford stuff for a good joke to anybody, let him not be backward, but let him cheerfully allow himself to spend and be spent in that way. And the man that has anything bountifully laughable about him, be sure there is more in that man than you perhaps think for.

  Herman Melville

  Men, Thinking, Laughing

  Herman Melville (2015). “Annotated Moby Dick or, the Whale with English Grammar Exercises: by Herman Melville (Author), Robert Powell (Editor)”, p.40, Powell Publications, LLC

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• What would men be without women? Scarce, sir...mighty scarce.

  Mark Twain

  Inspirational, Funny, Life

  Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain on Common Sense: Timeless Advice and Words of Wisdom from America's Most-Revered Humorist”, p.22, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

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• Life's a forge - Yes, and hammer and anvil, too. You'll be roasted, smelted, and pounded, and you'll scarce know what's happening to you. But stand proudly to it. Metal's worthless till it is shaped and tempered. More labor than luck. Face the pounding, don't fear the proving; and you'll stand well against any hammer and anvil.

  Lloyd Alexander

  Luck, Hammers, Anvils

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• I died for beauty but was scarce Adjusted in the tomb, When one who died for truth was lain In an adjoining room. He questioned softly why I failed? "For beauty," I replied. "And I for truth, the two are one; We brethren are," he said. And so, as kinsmen met a night, We talked between the rooms, Until the moss had reached our lips, And covered up our names.

  Emily Dickinson

  Night, Covered Up, Names

  "I died for beauty but was scarce" l. 1 (ca. 1862)

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• 'Untitled' is a time machine that can transport you to 1992, an edgy moment when the art world was crumbling, money was scarce, and artists like Tiravanija were in the nascent stages of combining Happenings, performance art, John Cage, Joseph Beuys, and the do-it-yourself ethos of punk. Meanwhile, a new art world was coming into being.

  Jerry Saltz

  Art, Ethos, Crumbling

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• The forties, seventies, and the nineties, when money was scarce, were great periods, when the art world retracted but it was also reborn.

  Jerry Saltz

  Art, World, Periods

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• In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place, and in the sky, The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard among the guns below.

  John McCrae

  Blow, Gun, Sky

  Punch 8 Dec. 1915 "In Flanders Fields"

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• Live life to the fullest, for the future is scarce.

  Nick Carter

  Life, Live To The Fullest, Live Life

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• With you a part of me hath passed away; For in the peopled forest of my mind A tree made leafless by this wintry wind Shall never don again its green array. Chapel and fireside, country road and bay, Have something of their friendliness resigned; Another, if I would, I could not find, And I am grown much older in a day. But yet I treasure in my memory Your gift of charity, and young hearts ease, And the dear honour of your amity; For these once mine, my life is rich with these. And I scarce know which part may greater be,-- What I keep of you, or you rob from me.

  George Santayana

  Country, Memories, Heart

  George Santayana, Martin A. Coleman (2009). “The Essential Santayana: Selected Writings”, p.484, Indiana University Press

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