Great Throughts Treasury

"Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow."

"In a wife I would desire what in whores is always found the lineaments of gratified desire."

"In every cry of every man, in every infant’s cry of fear, in every voice, in every ban, the mind-forg'd manacles I hear."

"In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy."

"In the morning glad I see my foe outstretch'd beneath the tree."

"In the universe, there are things that are known, and things that are unknown, and in between, there are doors."

"In what distant deeps or skies burnt the fire of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire?"

"Infant joy. I have no name I am but two days old.- what shall I call thee? I happy am joy is my name,- sweet joy befell thee! Pretty joy! Sweet joy but two days old. Sweet joy I call thee: thou dost smile. I sing the while sweet joy befell thee."

"Innate ideas are in every man, born with him; they are truly himself. The man who says that we have no innate ideas must be a fool and knave, having no conscience or innate science."

"Invention depends altogether upon execution or organization; as that is right or wrong so is the invention perfect or imperfect."

"Is this a holy thing to see in a rich and fruitful land, babes reduced to misery, fed with cold and usurious hand?"

"It appears to me that men are hired to run down men of genius under the mask of translators, but Dante gives too much of Caesar: he is not a republican."

"It is an easy thing to rejoice in the tents of prosperity: thus could I sing and thus rejoice: but it is not so with me."

"It is not because angels are holier than men or devils that makes them angels, but because they do not expect holiness from one another, but from God only."

"It is right it should be so; man was made for joy and woe; and when this we rightly know, thro' the world we safely go. Joy and woe are woven fine, a clothing for the soul divine. Under every grief and pine runs a joy with silken twine."

"It matters not how straight the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul."

"Jerusalem. And did those feet in ancient time walk upon England's mountains green and was the holy lamb of God on England's pleasant pastures seen and did the countenance divine shine forth upon our clouded hills and was Jerusalem builded here among those dark satanic mills bring me my bow of burning gold bring me my arrows of desire bring me my spears o'clouds unfold bring me my chariot of fire I will not cease from mental fight nor shall my sword sleep in my hand 'til we have built Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land"

"Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules."

"Knowledge is life with wings."

"Let man wear the fell of the lion, woman the fleece of the sheep."

"Let thy west wind sleep on the lake; speak silence with thy glimmering eyes, and wash the dusk with silver."

"Life delights in life."

"Like a fiend hid in a cloud."

"Like a fiend in a cloud, With howling woe After night I do crowd And with night will go; I turn my back to the east, From whence comforts have increased; For light cloth seize my brain With frantic pain."

"Listen to the fools reproach! It is a kingly title!"

"Little boy full of joy; little girl, sweet and small;"

"Little fly thy summers play, my thoughtless hand has brush'd away. Am not I a fly like thee? Or art not thou a man like me? For I dance and drink and sing: till some blind hand shall brush my wing. If thought is life and strength and breath: and the want of thought is death; then am I a happy fly, if I live, or if I die"

"Little Lamb who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee?"

"Lives in eternity’s sun rise."

"Lo! now the direful monster, whose skin clings To his strong bones, strides o'er the groaning rocks: He withers all in silence, and his hand Unclothes the earth, and freezes up frail life."

"Love is not blind; it simply enables one to see things others fail to see."

"Love seeketh not itself to please, Nor for itself hath any care, But for another gives its ease, And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair. Love seeketh only Self to please, To bind another to its delight, Joys in another's loss of ease, And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite."

"Love to faults is always blind, always is to joys inclined, lawless, winged, and unconfined, and breaks all chains from every mind."

"Love's secret. Never seek to tell thy love, love that never told can be; for the gentle wind doth move silently, invisibly. I told my love, I told my love, I told her all my heart, trembling, cold, in ghastly fears. Ah! She did depart! Soon after she was gone from me, a traveler came by, silently, invisibly: he took her with a sigh."

"Make your own rules or be a slave to another man's."

"Man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through the narrow chinks of his cavern."

"Man was made for joy and woe then when this we rightly know through the world we safely go. Joy and woe are woven fine a clothing for the soul to bind."

"Man's desires are limited by his perceptions; none can desire what he has not perceived."

"May God us keep from single vision and newton's sleep."

"Mechanical excellence is the only vehicle of genius."

"Men are admitted into heaven not because they have curbed and governed their passions or have no passions, but because they have cultivated their understandings. The treasures of heaven are not negations of passion, but realities of intellect, from which all the passions emanate uncurbed in their eternal glory. The fool shall not enter into heaven let him be ever so holy."

"Mercy is the golden chain by which society is bound together."

"Mere enthusiasm is the all in all... Passion and expression are beauty itself."

"Mirth is better than fun, and happiness is better than mirth."

"Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau. Mock on, mock on—'tis all in vain! You throw the sand against the wind, and the wind blows it back again."

"My brother starv'd between two walls, his children's cry my soul appalls."

"My mother bore me in the southern wild, and I am black, but o! My soul is white; white as an angel is the English child, but I am black as if bereaved of light… and we are put on earth a little space, that we may learn to bear the beams of love, and these black bodies and this sunburnt face is but a cloud, and like a shady grove… I’ll shade him from the heat till he can bear to lean in joy upon our father's knee; and then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair, and be like him and he will then love me."

"My mother groan'd! My father wept. Into the dangerous world I leapt: helpless, naked, piping loud: like a fiend hid in a cloud."

"My silks and fine array, my smiles and languish'd air, by love are driv'n away; and mournful lean despair brings me yew to deck my grave: such end true lovers have."

"Nature in darkness groans and men are bound to sullen contemplation in the night: restless they turn on beds of sorrow; in their inmost brain feeling the crushing wheels, they rise, they write the bitter words of stern philosophy and knead the bread of knowledge with tears and groans."