Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
We allude to the short prose narrative, requiring from a half hour to one or two hours in its perusal
Of puns it has been said that those who most dislike them are those who are least able to utter them.
The mere imitation, however accurate, of what is in Nature, entitles no man to the sacred name of Artist
In the deepest slumber-no! In delirium-no! In a swoon-no! In death-no! even in the grave all is not lost.
It is the nature of truth in general, as of some ores in particular, to be richest when most superficial.
Even for those to whom life and death are equal jests. There are some things that are still held in respect.
Decorum -- that bug-bear which deters so many from bliss until the opportunity for bliss has forever gone by.
It may be roundly asserted that human ingenuity cannot concoct a cipher which human ingenuity cannot resolve.
A poem in my opinion, is opposed to a work of science by having for its immediate object, pleasure, not truth.
It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain, but, once conceived, it haunted me day and night.
To be thoroughly conversant with Man’s heart, is to take our final lesson in the iron-clasped volume of Despair
I have made no money. I am as poor now as ever I was in my life - except in hope, which is by no means bankable.
If in many of my productions terror has been the thesis, I maintain that terror is not of Germany, but of the soul.
As a poet and as a mathematician, he would reason well; as a mere mathematician, he could not have reasoned at all.
Men have called me mad; but the question is not yet settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence.
It is with literature as with law or empire - an established name is an estate in tenure, or a throne in possession.
Even with the utterly lost, to whom life and death are equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can be made.
Sometimes I’m terrified of my heart; of its constant hunger for whatever it is it wants. The way it stops and starts.
There are moments when, even to the sober eye of Reason, the world of our sad humanity must assume the aspect of Hell.
I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity.
...If you do not take it up with you in some way, I shall be under the necessity of breaking your head with this shovel
Every moment of the night Forever changing places And they put out the star-light With the breath from their pale faces
In me didst thou exist-and, in my death, see by this image, which is thine own, how utterly thou hast murdered thyself.
We gave the Future to the winds, and slumbered tranquilly in the Present, weaving the dull world around us into dreams.
And then there stole into my fancy, like a rich musical note, the thought of what sweet rest there must be in the grave.
Children are never too tender to be whipped. Like tough beefsteaks, the more you beat them, the more tender they become.
We gave him a hearty welcome, for there was nearly half as much of the entertaining as of the contemptible about the man.
If we cannot comprehend God in his visible works, how then in his inconceivable thoughts, that call the works into being?
In criticism I will be bold, and as sternly, absolutely just with friend and foe. From this purpose nothing shall turn me.
Believe me, there exists no such dilemma as that in which a gentleman is placed when he is forced to reply to a blackguard.
It will be found, in fact, that the ingenious are always fanciful, and the truly imaginative never otherwise than analytic.
I hold that a long poem does not exist. I maintain that the phrase, "a long poem," is simply a flat contradiction in terms.
The pioneers and missionaries of religion have been the real cause of more trouble and war than all other classes of mankind.
In visions of the dark night I have dreamed of joy departed-- But a waking dream of life and light Hath left me broken-hearted.
In reading some books we occupy ourselves chiefly with the thoughts of the author; in perusing others, exclusively with our own.
Over the Mountains Of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied,- "If you seek for Eldorado.
Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells, From the bells, bells, bells.
The true genius shudders at incompleteness - and usually prefers silence to saying something which is not everything it should be.
I call to mind flatness and dampness; and then all is madness - the madness of a memory which busies itself among forbidden things.
The result of law inviolate is perfection–right–negative happiness. The result of law violate is imperfection, wrong, positive pain.
Villains!' I shrieked. 'Dissemble no more! I admit the deed! Tear up the planks! Here, here! It is the beating of his hideous heart!
He knew that Hop-Frog was not fond of wine; for it excited the poor cripple almost to madness; and madness is no comfortable feeling.
In the marginalia ... we talk only to ourselves; we therefore talk freshly - boldly - originally - with abandonment - without conceit.
It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream.
the truth is, I am heartily sick of this life & of the nineteenth century in general. (I am convinced that every thing is going wrong.)
He is, as you say, a remarkable horse, a prodigious horse, although as you very justly observe, a suspicious and untractable character.
Marking a book is literally an experience of your differences or agreements with the author. It is the highest respect you can pay him.
I am walking like a bewitched corpse, with the certainty of being eaten by the infinite, of being annulled by the only existing Absurd.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?