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In The Deepest Slumber-no! In Delirium-no! In A Swoon-no! In Death-no! Even In The Grave All Is Not Lost.
-Edgar Allan Poe
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In The Deepest Slumber-no!

Edgar Allan Poe
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In The Deepest Slumber-no! In Delirium-no! In A Swoon-no! In Death-no! Even In The Grave All Is Not Lost.

Understanding the Quote: "in the deepest slumber-no! in delirium-no! in a swoon-no! in death-no! even..."

This quote by Edgar Allan Poe reflects deeply on the theme of slumber. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Slumber, Delirium, Lost, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Edgar Allan Poe interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe is celebrated for insightful thoughts on slumber and delirium. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Slumber
Delirium
Lost
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It Is More Than Probable That I Am Not Understood; But I Fear, Indeed, That It Is In No Manner Possible To Convey To The Mind Of The Merely General Reader, An Adequate Idea Of That Nervous Intensity Of Interest With Which, In My Case, The Powers Of Meditation (not To Speak Technically) Busied And Buried Themselves, In The Contemplation Of Even The Most Ordinary Objects Of The Universe.
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...and, All At Once, The Moon Arouse Through The Thin Ghastly Mist, And Was Crimson In Color... And They Lynx Which Dwelleth Forever In The Tomb, Came Out Therefrom. And Lay Down At The Feet Of The Demon. And Looked At Him Steadily In The Face.
Moon
Color
Feet
In Efforts To Soar Above Our Nature, We Invariably Fall Below It.
Fall
Effort
Soar
You Need Not Attempt To Shake Off Or To Banter Off Romance. It Is An Evil You Will Never Get Rid Of To The End Of Your Days. It Is A Part Of Yourself ... Of Your Soul. Age Will Only Mellow It A Little, And Give It A Holier Tone.
Evil
Giving
Romance
...for The Question Is Of Will, And Not, As The Insanity Of Logic Has Assumed Of Power. It Is Not That The Deity Cannot Modify His Laws, But That We Insult Him In Imagining A Possible Necessity For Modification. In Their Origin These Laws Were Fashioned To Embrace All Contingencies Which Could Lie In The Future. With God All Is Now.
Lying
Law
Insanity
With Me Poetry Has Been Not A Purpose, But A Passion; And The Passions Should Be Held In Reverence: They Must Not They Cannot At Will Be Excited, With An Eye To The Paltry Compensations, Or The More Paltry Commendations, Of Mankind.
Passion
Eye
Purpose
I Wish I Could Write As Mysterious As A Cat.
Inspirational
Life
Writing
If Any Ambitious Man Have A Fancy To Revolutionize, At One Effort, The Universal World Of Human Thought, Human Opinion, And Human Sentiment.
Men
Effort
Ambitious
The Sole Purpose Is To Provide Infinite Springs, At Which The Soul May Allay The Eternal Thirst To Know Which Is Forever Unquenchable Within It, Since To Quench It, Would Be To Extinguish The Soul's Self.
Spring
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Forever
For The Moon Never Beams Without Bringing Me Dreams Of The Beautiful Annabel Lee
Beautiful
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A Strong Argument For The Religion Of Christ Is This - That Offences Against Charity Are About The Only Ones Which Men On Their Death-beds Can Be Made - Not To Understand - But To Feel - As Crime.
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Bed
Finally On Sunday Morning, October 7, 1849, "he Became Quiet And Seemed To Rest For A Short Time. Then, Gently, Moving His Head," He Said, "lord Help My Poor Soul." As He Had Lived So He Died-in Great Misery And Tragedy.
Life
Morning
Moving
Hear The Sledges With The Bells, Silver Bells! What A World Of Merriment Their Melody Foretells! How They Tinkle, Tinkle, Tinkle, In The Icy Air Of Night, While The Stars That Oversprinkle All The Heavens Seem To Twinkle With A Crystalline Delight: Keeping Time, Time, Time, In A Sort Of Runic Rhyme To The Tintinnabulation That So Musically Wells From The Bells, Bells, Bells, Bells, Bells, Bells, Bells-- From The Jingling And The Tingling Of The Bells.
Stars
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Air
Villains!' I Shrieked. 'dissemble No More! I Admit The Deed! Tear Up The Planks! Here, Here! It Is The Beating Of His Hideous Heart!
Heart
Guilt
Tears
In Spite Of The Air Of Fablethe Public Were Still Not At All Disposed To Receive It As Fable. I Thence Concluded That The Facts Of My Narrative Would Prove Of Such A Nature As To Carry With Them Sufficient Evidence Of Their Own Authenticity.
Reality
Air
Facts
I Was Never Kinder To The Old Man Than During The Whole Week Before I Killed Him.
Men
Week
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To See Distinctly The Machinery--the Wheels And Pinions--of Any Work Of Art Is, Unquestionably, Of Itself, A Pleasure, But One Which We Are Able To Enjoy Only Just In Proportion As We Do Not Enjoy The Legitimate Effect Designed By The Artist.
Art
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Now This Is The Point. You Fancy Me A Mad. Madmen Know Nothing. But You Should Have Seen Me. You Should Have Seen How Wisely I Proceeded.
Should Have
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The Greater Amount Of Truth Is Impulsively Uttered; Thus The Greater Amount Is Spoken, Not Written.
Truth
Greater
Written
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.
Dream
Dark
Night
The People Have Nothing To Do With The Laws But To Obey Them.
Law
People
There Are Few Persons Who Have Not, At Some Period Of Their Lives, Amused Themselves In Retracing The Steps By Which Particular Conclusions Of Their Own Minds Have Been Attained. The Occupation Is Often Full Of Interest And He Who Attempts It For The First Time Is Astonished By The Apparently Illimitable Distance And Incoherence Between The Starting-point And The Goal.
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Quaff, Oh Quaff This Kind Nepenthe, And Forget This Lost Lenore!
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Kind
Forget
Many Years Ago, I Contracted An Intimacy With A Mr. William Legrand. He Was Of An Ancient Huguenot Family, And Had Once Been Wealthy; But A Series Of Misfortunes Had Reduced Him To Want.
Book
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There Is Then No Analogy Whatever Between The Operations Of The Chess-player, And Those Of The Calculating Machine Of Mr. Babbage , And If We Choose To Call The Former A Pure Machine We Must Be Prepared To Admit That It Is, Beyond All Comparison, The Most Wonderful Of The Inventions Of Mankind.
Player
Analogies
Chess
Never To Suffer Would Have Been Never To Have Been Blessed.
Spiritual
Blessed
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And So Faintly You Came Tapping, Tapping At My Chamber Door, That I Scarce Was Sure I Heard You"— Here I Opened Wide The Door; — Darkness There, And Nothing More.
Doors
Darkness
Heard
Invisible Things Are The Only Realities.
Halloween
Reality
Invisible
Philosophers Have Often Held Dispute As To The Seat Of Thought In Man And Brute For That The Power Of Thought Attends The Latter My Friend, Thy Beau, Hath Made A Settled Matter, And Spite Of Dogmas Current In All Ages, One Settled Fact Is Better Than Ten Sages. (o,tempora! O,mores!)
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Matter
A Man's Grammar, Like Caesar's Wife, Must Not Only Be Pure, But Above Suspicion Of Impurity.
Writing
Men
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The Bostonians Are Really, As A Race, Far Inferior In Point Of Anything Beyond Mere Intellect To Any Other Set Upon The Continent Of North America. They Are Decidedly The Most Servile Imitators Of The English It Is Possible To Conceive.
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America
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Believe Me, There Exists No Such Dilemma As That In Which A Gentleman Is Placed When He Is Forced To Reply To A Blackguard.
Believe
Gentleman
Believe In Me
In The Tale Proper--where There Is No Space For Development Of Character Or For Great Profusion And Variety Of Incident--mere Construction Is, Of Course, Far More Imperatively Demanded Than In The Novel.
Character
Space
Development
There Is No Passion In Nature So Demoniacally Impatient, As That Of Him Who, Shuddering Upon The Edge Of A Precipice, Thus Meditates A Plunge.
Passion
Impatient
Plunge
Ghastly Grim And Ancient Raven Wandering From The Nightly Shore - Tell Me What Thy Lordly Name Is On The Night's Plutonian Shore! Quoth The Raven, `nevermore.
Night
Names
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The Eye, Like A Shattered Mirror, Multiplies The Images Of Sorrow
Eye
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We Allude To The Short Prose Narrative, Requiring From A Half Hour To One Or Two Hours In Its Perusal
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As The Strong Man Exults In His Physical Ability, Delighting In Such Exercises As Call His Muscles Into Action, So Glories The Analyst In That Moral Activity Which Disentangles.
Strong
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I Stand Amid The Roar Of A Surf-tormented Shore, And I Hold Within My Hand Grains Of Golden Sand- How Few! Yet How They Creep Through My Fingers To The Deep, While I Weep- While I Weep!
Hands
Golden
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A Poem In My Opinion, Is Opposed To A Work Of Science By Having For Its Immediate Object, Pleasure, Not Truth.
Science
Opinion
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O, Times! O, Manners! It Is My Opinion That You Are Changing Sadly Your Dominion I Mean The Reign Of Manners Hath Long Ceased, For Men Have None At All, Or Bad At Least; And As For Times, Altho' 'tis Said By Many The "good Old Times" Were Far The Worst Of Any, Of Which Sound Doctrine I Believe Each Tittle Yet Still I Think These Worst A Little. I've Been A Thinking -isn't That The Phrase?- I Like Your Yankee Words And Yankee Ways - I've Been A Thinking, Whether It Were Best To Take Things Seriously, Or All In Jest
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Men
There Are Few Persons, Even Among The Calmest Thinkers, Who Have Not Occasionally Been Startled Into A Vague Yet Thrilling Half Credence In The Supernatural, By Coincidences Of So Seemingly Marvellous A Character That, As Mere Coincidences, The Intellect Has Been Unable To Receive Them.
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For The Moon Never Beams Without Bringing Me Dreams Of The Beautiful Annabel Lee; And The Stars Never Rise But I Feel The Bright Eyes Of The Beautiful Annabel Lee; And So, All The Night-tide, I Lie Down By The Side Of My Darling- My Darling- My Life And My Bride, In The Sepulchre There By The Sea, In Her Tomb By The Sounding Sea.
Beautiful
Death
Dream
In Reading Some Books We Occupy Ourselves Chiefly With The Thoughts Of The Author; In Perusing Others, Exclusively With Our Own.
Book
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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.
Wine
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Ah, Distinctly I Remember It Was In The Bleak December; And Each Separate Dying Ember Wrought Its Ghost Upon The Floor. Eagerly, I Wished The Morrow; - Vainly I Had Sought To Borrow From My Books Surcease Of Sorrow - Sorrow For The Lost Leonore - For The Rare And Radiant Maiden Who The Angels Name Lenore - Nameless Here For Evermore.
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I Found Him Well Educated, With Unusual Powers Of Mind, But Infected With Misanthropy, And Subject To Perverse Moods Of Alternate Enthusiasm And Melancholy.
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In One Case Out Of A Hundred A Point Is Excessively Discussed Because It Is Obscure; In The Ninety-nine Remaining It Is Obscure Because It Is Excessively Discussed.
Ninety Nine
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I Call To Mind Flatness And Dampness; And Then All Is Madness - The Madness Of A Memory Which Busies Itself Among Forbidden Things.
Memories
Mind
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Men Have Called Me Mad; But The Question Is Not Yet Settled, Whether Madness Is Or Is Not The Loftiest Intelligence.
Intelligent
Men
Mad
And Each Separate Dying Ember Wrought Its Ghost Upon The Floor.
Dying
Ghost
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You Will Observe That The Stories Told Are All About Money-seekers, Not About Money-finders.
Stories
Seekers
The Most 'popular,' The Most 'successful' Writers Among Us (for A Brief Period, At Least) Are, 99 Times Out Of A Hundred, Persons Of Mere Effrontery-in A Word, Busy-bodies, Toadies, Quacks.
Successful
Body
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There Are Certain Themes Of Which The Interest Is All-absorbing, But Which Are Too Entirely Horrible For The Purposes Of Legitimate Fiction.
Purpose
Fiction
Certain
In Our Endeavors To Recall To Memory Something Long Forgotten, We Often Find Ourselves Upon The Very Verge Of Remembrance, Without Being Able, In The End, To Remember.
Memories
Long
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We Gave The Future To The Winds, And Slumbered Tranquilly In The Present, Weaving The Dull World Around Us Into Dreams.
Dream
Wind
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And Then There Stole Into My Fancy, Like A Rich Musical Note, The Thought Of What Sweet Rest There Must Be In The Grave.
Sweet
Musical
Fancy
It Would Be Mockery To Call Such Dreariness Heaven At All.
Heaven
Would Be
Mockery
One Morning, In Cool Blood, I Slipped A Noose About Its Neck And Hung It To The Limb Of A Tree; — Hung It With The Tears Streaming From My Eyes, And With The Bitterest Remorse At My Heart; — Hung It Because I Knew That It Had Loved Me, And Because I Felt It Had Given Me No Reason Of Offence; — Hung It Because I Knew That In So Doing I Was Committing A Sin — A Deadly Sin That Would So Jeopardize My Immortal Soul As To Place It — If Such A Thing Were Possible — Even Beyond The Reach Of The Infinite Mercy Of The Most Merciful And Most Terrible God.
Morning
Eye
Heart
All Works Of Art Should Begin... At The End.
Art
Ends
Should
The Mere Imitation, However Accurate, Of What Is In Nature, Entitles No Man To The Sacred Name Of Artist
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Men
Names
I Was Forced To Fall Back Upon The Unsatisfactory Conclusion, That While, Beyond Doubt, There Are Combinations Of Very Simple Natural Objects Which Have The Power Of Thus Affecting Us, Still The Analysis Of This Power Lies Among Considerations Beyond Our Depth. It Was Possible, I Reflected, That A Mere Different Arrangement Of The Particulars Of The Scene, Of The Details Of The Picture, Would Be Sufficient To Modify, Or Perhaps To Annihilate Its Capacity For Sorrowful Impression.
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Simple
I Fell In Love With Melancholy
Melancholy
Not Hear It? --yes, I Hear It, And Have Heard It. Long --long --long --many Minutes, Many Hours, Many Days, Have I Heard It --yet I Dared Not --oh, Pity Me, Miserable Wretch That I Am! --i Dared Not --i Dared Not Speak! We Have Put Her Living In The Tomb!
Long
Speak
Miserable
If I Could Dwell Where Israfel Hath Dwelt And He Where I He Might Not Sing So Wildly Well A Mortal Melody While A Bolder Note Then This Might Swell From My Lyre In The Sky.
Sky
Might
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I Have, Indeed, No Abhorrence Of Danger, Except In Its Absolute Effect - In Terror.
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And The Life Of The Ebony Clock Went Out With That Of The Last Of The Gay. And The Flames Of The Tripods Expired. And Darkness And Decay And The Red Death Held Illimitable Dominion Over All.
Gay
Flames
Darkness
The Want Of An International Copy-right Law, By Rendering It Nearly Impossible To Obtain Anything From The Booksellers In The Wayof Remuneration For Literary Labor, Has Had The Effect Of Forcing Many Of Our Very Best Writers Into The Service Of The Magazines And Reviews.
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Hear The Mellow Wedding Bells, Golden Bells! What A World Of Happiness Their Harmony Foretells Through The Balmy Air Of Night How They Ring Out Their Delight! From The Molten Golden Notes, And All In Tune What A Liquid Ditty Floats To The Turtle-dove That Listens While She Gloats On The Moon!
Moon
Night
Turtles
The Best Chess-player In Christendom May Be Little More Than The Best Player Of Chess; But Proficiency In Whist Implies Capacity For Success In All Those More Important Undertakings Where Mind Struggles With Mind.
Struggle
Player
Mind
And The Raven, Never Flitting, Still Is Sitting, Still Is Sitting On The Pallid Bust Of Pallas Just Above My Chamber Door; And His Eyes Have All The Seeming Of A Demon's That Is Dreaming, And The Lamplight O'er Him Streaming Throws His Shadow On The Floor, And My Soul From Out That Shadow, That Lies Floating On The Floor, Shall Be Lifted - Nevermore.
Dream
Lying
Eye
Democracy Is A Very Admirable Form Of Government - For Dogs
Dog
Government
Democracy
Always Keep A Big Bottle Of Booze At Your Side. If A Bird Starts Talking Nonsense To You In The Middle Of The Night Pour Yourself A Stiff Drink.
Night
Talking
Your Side
Sometimes I’m Terrified Of My Heart; Of Its Constant Hunger For Whatever It Is It Wants. The Way It Stops And Starts.
Heartbreak
I Hate You
Want
Me Volví Loco, Con Largos Intervalos De Horrible Cordura.
Horrible
Imperceptibly The Love Of These Discords Grew Upon Me As My Love Of Music Grew Stronger.
Stronger
Music Love
Grew
There Is No Beauty Without Some Strangeness
Strangeness
For My Own Part, I Have Never Had A Thought Which I Could Not Set Down In Words, With Even More Distinctness Than That With Which I Conceived It.
My Own
The Thousand Injuries Of Fortunato I Had Borne As I Best Could, But When He Ventured Upon Insult I Vowed Revenge. You, Who So Well Know The Nature Of My Soul, Will Not Suppose, However, That Gave Utterance To A Threat. At Length I Would Be Avenged; This Was A Point Definitely, Settled --but The Very Definitiveness With Which It Was Resolved Precluded The Idea Of Risk. I Must Not Only Punish But Punish With Impunity. A Wrong Is Unredressed When Retribution Overtakes Its Redresser. It Is Equally Unredressed When The Avenger Fails To Make Himself Felt As Such To Him Who Has Done The Wrong.
Revenge
Ideas
Soul
The World Is A Great Ocean, Upon Which We Encounter More Tempestuous Storms Than Calms.
Ocean
Storm
Encounters
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. Ah! What Is Not A Dream By Day To Him Whose Eyes Are Cast On Things Around Him With A Ray Turned Back Upon The Past? That Holy Dream- That Holy Dream, While All The World Were Chiding, Hath Cheered Me As A Lovely Beam A Lonely Spirit Guiding. What Though That Light, Thro' Storm And Night, So Trembled From Afar- What Could There Be More Purely Bright In Truth's Day-star?
Life
Dream
Lonely
A Fool, For Example, Thinks Shakespeare A Great Poet . . . Yet The Fool Has Never Read Shakespeare.
Thinking
Example
Fool
Most Writers - Poets In Especial - Prefer Having It Understood That They Compose By A Species Of Fine Frenzy - An Ecstatic Intuition - And Would Positively Shudder At Letting The Public Take A Peep Behind The Scenes.
Writing
Creative
Intuition
No Pictorial Or Sculptural Combinations Of Points Of Human Loveliness, Do More Than Approach The Living And Breathing Human Beauty As It Gladdens Our Daily Path.
Breathing
Path
Combination
And I Fell Violently On My Face.
Faces
Keeping Time, Time, Time, In A Sort Of Runic Rhyme, To The Tintinnabulation That So Musically Wells, From The Bells, Bells, Bells.
Silver Bells
Icy
Bells Ringing
It All Depends On The Robber's Knowledge Of The Loser's Knowledge Of The Robber. - Daupin
Loser
Depends
Robbers
Literature Is The Most Noble Of Professions. In Fact, It Is About The Only One Fit For A Man.
Thoughtful
Men
Noble
It Is The Curse Of A Certain Order Of Mind, That It Can Never Rest Satisfied With The Consciousness Of Its Ability To Do A Thing.still Less Is It Content With Doing It. It Must Both Know And Show How It Was Done.
Order
Mind
Done
Those Who Gossip With You Will Gossip About You.
Gossip
Catchy
Sleep, Those Little Slices Of Death — How I Loathe Them.
Death
Sleep
Littles
There Are Two Bodies - The Rudimental And The Complete; Corresponding With The Two Conditions Of The Worm And The Butterfly. What We Call "death," Is But The Painful Metamorphosis. Our Present Incarnation Is Progressive, Preparatory, Temporary. Our Future Is Perfected, Ultimate, Immortal. The Ultimate Life Is The Full Design.
Death
Butterfly
Two
I Dread The Events Of The Future, Not In Themselves But In Their Results.
Events
Results
Dread
...for Her Whom In Life Thou Dids't Abhor, In Death Thou Shalt Adore
Adore
As A Poet And As A Mathematician, He Would Reason Well; As A Mere Mathematician, He Could Not Have Reasoned At All.
Reason
Poet
Mathematician
If A Poem Hasn't Ripped Apart Your Soul; You Haven't Experienced Poetry.
Soul
Torn Apart
Havens
If We Examine A Work Of Ordinary Art, By Means Of A Powerful Microscope, All Traces Of Resemblance To Nature Will Disappear - But The Closest Scrutiny Of The Photogenic Drawing Discloses Only A More Absolute Truth, A More Perfect Identity Of Aspect With The Thing Represented.
Photography
Art
Powerful
To Helen Helen, Thy Beauty Is To Me Like Those Nicean Barks Of Yore That Gently, O'er A Perfumed Sea, The Weary, Way-worn Wanderer Bore To His Own Native Shore. On Desperate Seas Long Wont To Roam, Thy Hyacinth Hair, Thy Classic Face, Thy Naiad Airs Have Brought Me Home To The Glory That Was Greece, And The Grandeur That Was Rome. Lo, In Yon Brilliant Window-niche How Statue-like I See Thee Stand, The Agate Lamp Within Thy Hand, Ah! Psyche, From The Regions Which Are Holy Land!
Beauty
Home
Hair
By Undue Profundity We Perplex And Enfeeble Thought; And It Is Possible To Make Even Venus Herself Vanish From The Firmament By A Scrutiny Too Sustained, Too Concentrated, Or Too Direct.
Venus
Scrutiny
Firmament
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.
Mean
Poor
Made
Yes, Heaven Is Thine; But This Is A World Of Sweets And Sours; Our Flowers Are Merely—flowers.
Sweet
Flower
Heaven
I Might Refer At Once, If Necessary, To A Hundred Well Authenticated Instances. One Of Very Remarkable Character, And Of Which The Circumstances May Be Fresh In The Memory Of Some Of My Readers, Occurred, Not Very Long Ago, In The Neighboring City Of Baltimore, Where It Occasioned A Painful, Intense, And Widely Extended Excitement.
Memories
Character
Long Ago
Poetry Is The Rhythmical Creation Of Beauty In Words.
Beauty
Thoughtful
Poetry
Were I Called On To Define, Very Briefly, The Term Art, I Should Call It 'the Reproduction Of What The Senses Perceive In Nature Through The Veil Of The Soul.' The Mere Imitation, However Accurate, Of What Is In Nature, Entitles No Man To The Sacred Name Of 'artist.'
Art
Nature
Men
In Other Words, I Believed, And Still Do Believe, That Truth, Is Frequently Of Its Own Essence, Superficial, And That, In Many Cases, The Depth Lies More In The Abysses Where We Seek Her, Than In The Actual Situations Wherein She May Be Found.
Lying
Believe
Essence
There Are Chords In The Hearts Of The Most Reckless Which Cannot Be Touched Without Emotion.
Heart
Emotion
Reckless
After Reading All That Has Been Written, And After Thinking All That Can Be Thought, On The Topics Of God And The Soul, The Man Who Has A Right To Say That He Thinks At All, Will Find Himself Face To Face With The Conclusion That, On These Topics, The Most Profound Thought Is That Which Can Be The Least Easily Distinguished From The Most Superficial Sentiment.
God
Reading
Men
It Was Many And Many A Year Ago, In A Kingdom By The Sea, That A Maiden There Lived Whom You May Know By The Name Of Annabel Lee;-- And This Maiden She Lived With No Other Thought Than To Love And Be Loved By Me.
Love
Death
Book
The Reproduction Of What The Senses Perceive In Nature Through The Veil Of The Soul.
Soul
Veils
Perceive
Years Of Love Have Been Forgot, In The Hatred Of A Minute.
Love
Life
Marriage
Reality Is The #1 Cause Of Insanity Among Those Who Are In Contact With It
Reality
Insanity
Causes
If You Wish To Forget Anything On The Spot, Make A Note That This Thing Is To Be Remembered.
Funny Life
Wish
Forget
As For Republicanism, No Analogy Could Be Found For It Upon The Face Of The Earth—unless We Except The Case Of The "prairie Dogs," An Exception Which Seems To Demonstrate, If Anything, That Democracy Is A Very Admirable Form Of Government—for Dogs.
Dog
Government
Democracy
Even With The Utterly Lost, To Whom Life And Death Are Equally Jests, There Are Matters Of Which No Jest Can Be Made.
Life And Death
Matter
Lost
The Higher Powers Of The Reflective Intellect Are More Decidedly And More Usefully Tasked By The Unostentatious Game Of Draughts Than By All The Elaborate Frivolity Of Chess.
Reflection
Games
Chess
The Writer Who Neglects Punctuation, Or Mispunctuates, Is Liable To Be Misunderstood For The Want Of Merely A Comma, It Often Occurs That An Axiom Appears A Paradox, Or That A Sarcasm Is Converted Into A Sermonoid.
Sarcasm
Misunderstood
Want
The Depth Lies In The Valleys Where We Seek Her, And Not Upon The Mountain-tops Where She Is Found.
Lying
Mountain
Depth
A Short Story Is "a Short Prose Narrative, Requiring From A Half Hour, To One Or Two Hours In Its Perusal...having Conceived, With Deliberate Care, A Certain Unique Or Single Effect To Be Wrought Out.
Unique
Two
Care
In Me Didst Thou Exist-and, In My Death, See By This Image, Which Is Thine Own, How Utterly Thou Hast Murdered Thyself.
Thyself
Happiness Is Not To Be Found In Knowledge, But In The Acquisition Of Knowledge
Acquisition
Found
The Goodness Of Your True Pun Is In The Direct Ratio Of Its Intolerability.
Ratios
Goodness
Punning
...the Agony Of My Soul Found Vent In One Loud, Long And Final Scream Of Despair.
Agony
Long
Soul
To Die Laughing Must Be The Most Glorious Of All Glorious Deaths!
Laughing
Glorious
Dies
Experience Has Shown, And A True Philosophy Will Always Show, That A Vast, Perhaps The Larger Portion Of The Truth Arises From The Seemingly Irrelevant.
Truth
Philosophy
Irrelevance
Deep Into That Darkness Peering, Long I Stood There Wondering, Fearing, Doubting, Dreaming Dreams No Mortals Ever Dared To Dream Before; But The Silence Was Unbroken, And The Stillness Gave No Token, And The Only Word There Spoken Was The Whispered Word, "lenore?" This I Whispered, And An Echo Murmured Back The Word, "lenore!" — Merely This, And Nothing More
Dream
Echoes
Long
But In The Expression Of The Countenance, Which Was Beaming All Over With Smiles, There Still Lurked (incomprehensible Anomalyl) That Fitful Strain Of Melancholy Which Will Ever Be Found Inseparable From The Perfection Of The Beautiful.
Beautiful
Perfection
Melancholy
Tell Me Truly, I Implore-- Is There-- Is There Balm In Gilead?--tell Me--tell Me, I Implore!
Were The Succession Of Stars Endless, Then The Background Of The Sky Would Present Us An Uniform Luminosity, Like That Displayed By The Galaxy-since There Could Be Absolutely No Point, In All That Background, At Which Would Not Exist A Star. The Only Mode, Therefore, In Which, Under Such A State Of Affairs, We Could Comprehend The Voids Which Our Telescopes Find In Innumerable Directions, Would Be By Supposing The Distance Of The Invisible Background So Immense That No Ray From It Has Yet Been Able To Reach Us At All.
Stars
Distance
Science
The Nose Of A Mob Is Its Imagination. By This, At Any Time, It Can Be Quietly Led.
Time
Imagination
Noses
Lord Help My Poor Soul.
Soul
Helping
Lord
Let Us Dismiss, As Irrelevant To The Poem Per Se, The Circumstance ... Which, In The First Place, Gave Rise To The Intention Of Composing A Poem That Should Suit At Once The Popular And The Critical Taste.
Rose
Taste
Firsts
And All I Loved, I Loved Alone.
I Seemed To Be Upon The Verge Of Comprehension, Without The Power To Comprehend As Men, At Time, Find Themselves Upon The Brink Of Rememberance, Without Being Able, In The End, To Remember.
Men
Able
Remember
The Idea Of God, Infinity, Or Spirit Stands For The Possible Attempt At An Impossible Conception.
Ideas
Atheism
Infinity
The Analytical Power Should Not Be Confounded With Simple Ingenuity; For While The Analyst Is Necessarily Ingenious, The Ingenious Man Is Often Remarkably Incapable Of Analysis.
Power
Simple
Men
As An Individual, I Myself Feel Impelled To Fancy ... A Limitless Succession Of Universes.... Each Exists, Apart And Independently, In The Bosom Of Its Proper And Particular God.
Fancy
Limitless
Individual
I Need Scarcely Observe That A Poem Deserves Its Title Only Inasmuch As It Excites, By Elevating The Soul. The Value Of The Poem Is In The Ratio Of This Elevating Excitement. But All Excitements Are, Through A Psychal Necessity, Transient.
Soul
Titles
Needs
I Am Shadow, And My Dwelling Is Near To The Catacombs Of Ptolemais, And Hard By Those Dim Plains Of Helusion Which Border Upon The Foul Charonian Canal." And Then Did We, The Seven, Start From Our Seats In Horror, And Stand Trembling, And Shuddering, And Aghast, For The Tones In The Voice Of The Shadow Were Not The Tones Of Any One Being, But Of A Multitude Of Beings, And, Varying In Their Cadences From Syllable To Syllable Fell Duskly Upon Our Ears In The Well-remembered And Familiar Accents Of Many Thousand Departed Friends.
Voice
Dwelling
Departed
Thy Soul Shall Find Itself Alone ’mid Dark Thoughts Of The Gray Tombstone— Not One, Of All The Crowd, To Pry Into Thine Hour Of Secrecy. Be Silent In That Solitude, Which Is Not Loneliness—for Then The Spirits Of The Dead Who Stood In Life Before Thee Are Again In Death Around Thee—and Their Will Shall Overshadow Thee: Be Still. [...]
Loneliness
Tombstone
Dark
Mournful And Never-ending Remembrance.
Memories
Remembrance
Perverseness
Dreams Are The Eraser Dust I Blow Off My Page. They Fade Into The Emptiness, Another Dark Gray Day. Dreams Are Only Memories Of The Plans I Had Back Then. Dreams Are Eraser Dust And Now I Use A Pen.
Dream
Memories
Dark
Sound-- That Stealeth Ever On The Ear Of Him Who, Musing, Gazeth On The Distance Dim, And Sees The Darkness Coming As A Cloud-- Is Not Its Form--its Voice--most Palpable And Loud?
Distance
Clouds
Voice
Art Is To Look At Not To Criticize.
Art
Looks
Criticize
The Fury Of A Demon Instantly Possessed Me. I Knew Myself No Longer. My Original Soul Seemed, At Once, To Take Its Flight From My Body; And A More Than Fiendish Malevolence, Gin-nurtured, Thrilled Every Fibre Of My Frame.
Soul
Body
Flight
That Man Is Not Truly Brave Who Is Afraid Either To Seem Or To Be, When It Suits Him, A Coward.
Courage
Thoughtful
Men
Every Poem Should Remind The Reader That They Are Going To Die.
Should
Reader
Dies
You Call It Hope-that Fire Of Fire! It Is But Agony Of Desire.
Fire
Agony
Desire
And Now Have I Not Told You That What You Mistake For Madness Is But Overacuteness Of The Senses?
Mistake
Madness
Senses
Odors Have An Altogether Peculiar Force, In Affecting Us Through Association; A Force Differing Essentially From That Of Objects Addressing The Touch, The Taste, The Sight Or The Hearing.
Sight
Smell
Odor
Boston: Their Hotels Are Bad. Their Pumpkin Pies Are Delicious. Their Poetry Is Not So Good.
Boston
Pie
Pumpkin
In The Marginalia ... We Talk Only To Ourselves; We Therefore Talk Freshly - Boldly - Originally - With Abandonment - Without Conceit.
Writing
Abandonment
Conceit
The Mental Features Discoursed Of As The Analytical, Are, In Themselves, But Little Susceptible Of Analysis. We Appreciate Them Only In Their Effects. We Know Of Them, Among Other Things, That They Are Always To Their Possessor, When Inordinately Possessed, A Source Of The Liveliest Enjoyment.
Book
Appreciate
Analysis
To Be Thoroughly Conversant With Man’s Heart, Is To Take Our Final Lesson In The Iron-clasped Volume Of Despair
Heart
Men
Iron
Truth Is Not Always In A Well. In Fact, As Regards The More Important Knowledge, I Do Believe That She Is Invariably Superficial. The Depth Lies In The Valleys Where We Seek Her, And Not Upon The Mountain-tops Where She Is Found.
Lying
Believe
Important
But Our Love Was Stronger By Far Than The Love Of Those Who Were Older Than We Of Many Far Wiser Than We And Neither The Angels In Heaven Above, Nor The Demons Down Under The Sea, Can Ever Dissever My Soul From The Soul Of The Beautiful Annabel Lee.
Beautiful
Angel
Sea
[e]very Plot, Worth The Name, Must Be Elaborated To Its Dénouement Before Anything Be Attempted With The Pen. It Is Only With The Dénouement Constantly In View That We Can Plot Its Indispensable Air Of Consequence, Or Causation, By Making The Incidents, And Especially The Tone At All Points Tend To The Development Of The Intention.
Air
Views
Names
...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
Way
Shovels
Ifs
Indeed, There Is An Eloquence In True Enthusiasm That Is Not To Be Doubted.
Enthusiasm
Eloquence
Doubted
If In Many Of My Productions Terror Has Been The Thesis, I Maintain That Terror Is Not Of Germany, But Of The Soul.
Soul
Germany
Originality
Alas! For That Accursed Time They Bore Thee O'er The Billow, From Love To Titled Age And Crime, And An Unholy Pillow! From Me, And From Our Misty Clime, Where Weeps The Silver Willow!
Age
Silver
Crime
In [chess], Where The Pieces Have Different And "bizarre" Motions, With Various And Variable Values, What Is Only Complex, Is Mistaken (a Not Unusual Error) For What Is Profound
Errors
Profound
Pieces
Quoth The Raven, "nevermore.
Tombstone
Ravens
Nevermore
Deep Into That Darkness Peering, Long I Stood There, Wondering, Fearing, Doubting, Dreaming Dreams No Mortal Ever Dared To Dream Before.
Love
Dream
Art
All Suffering Originates From Craving, From Attachment, From Desire.
Attachment
Suffering
Desire
And So, Being Young And Dipt In Folly, I Fell In Love With Melancholy.
Love
Inspirational
Life
That Single Thought Is Enough. The Impulse Increases To A Wish, The Wish To A Desire, The Desire To An Uncontrollable Longing, And The Longing (to The Deep Regret And Mortification Of The Speaker, And In Defiance Of All Consequences,) Is Indulged.
Regret
Wish
Desire
The Believer Is Happy. The Doubter Is Wise.
Wise
Doubters
Catchy
If You Are Ever Drowned Or Hung, Be Sure And Make A Note Of Your Sensations.
Notes
Hung
Ifs
Sensations Are The Great Things, After All. Should You Ever Be Drowned Or Hung, Be Sure And Make A Note Of Your Sensations; They Will Be Worth To You Ten Guineas A Sheet.
Guinea
Notes
Should
If You Have Never Been At Sea In A Heavy Gale, You Can Form No Idea Of The Confusion Of Mind Occasioned By Wind And Spry Together. They Blind, Deafen, And Strangle You, And Take Away All Power Of Action Or Reflection.
Reflection
Wind
Sea
Books, Indeed, Were His Sole Luxuries
Book
Luxury
Sole
In Beauty Of Face No Maiden Ever Equaled Her. It Was The Radiance Of An Opium-dream - An Airy And Spirit-lifting Vision More Wildly Divine Than The Fantasies Which Hovered About The Slumbering Souls Of The Daughters Of Delos.
Daughter
Dream
Soul
Once Upon A Midnight Dreary
Midnight
Dreary
Yet We Met; And Fate Bound Us Together At The Alter,and I Never Spoke Of Passion Nor Thought Of Love. She, However Shunned Society, And, Attaching Herself To Me Alone Rendered Me Happy. It Is A Happiness To Wonder; It Is A Happiness To Dream.
Dream
Passion
Fate
There Was Much Of The Beautiful, Much Of The Wanton, Much Of The Bizarre, Something Of The Terrible, And Not A Little Of That Which Might Have Excited Disgust.
Beautiful
Littles
Might
Marking A Book Is Literally An Experience Of Your Differences Or Agreements With The Author. It Is The Highest Respect You Can Pay Him.
Book
Agreement
Differences
Sound Loves To Revel In A Summer Night.
Summer
Night
Sound
The Merchant, To Secure His Treasure The Merchant, To Secure His Treasure, Conveys It In A Borrowed Name: Euphelia Serves To Grace My Measure, But Cloe Is My Real Flame. My Softest Verse, My Darling Lyre Upon Euphelia's Toilet Lay - When Cloe Noted Her Desire That I Should Sing, That I Should Play. My Lyre I Tune, My Voice I Raise, But With My Numbers Mix My Sighs; And Whilst I Sing Euphelia's Praise, I Fix My Soul On Cloe's Eyes. Fair Cloe Blushed; Euphelia Frowned: I Sung, And Gazed; I Played, And Trembled: And Venus To The Loves Around Remarked How Ill We All Dissembled.
Love
Real
Eye
Yet I Am Not More Sure That My Soul Lives, Than I Am That Perverseness Is One Of The Primitive Impulses Of The Human Heart - One Of The Indivisible Primary Faculties, Or Sentiments, Which Give Direction To The Character Of Man. Who Has Not, A Hundred Times, Found Himself Committing A Vile Or A Silly Action, For No Other Reason Than Because He Knows He Should Not? Have We Not A Perpetual Inclination, In The Teeth Of Our Best Judgment, To Violate That Which Is Law, Merely Because We Understand It To Be Such?
Silly
Heart
Character
The Enormous Multiplication Of Books In Every Branch Of Knowledge Is One Of The Greatest Evils Of This Age, Since It Presents One Of The Most Serious Obstacles To The Acquisition Of Correct Information By Throwing In The Reader's Way Piles Of Lumber In Which He Must Painfully Grope For The Scraps Of Useful Matter, Peradventure Interspersed.
Book
Evil
Age
The Past Is A Pebble In My Shoe.
Past
Shoes
Legacy
To Vilify A Great Man Is The Readiest Way In Which A Little Man Can Himself Attain Greatness.
Thoughtful
Greatness
Men
My Next Thought Concerned The Choice Of An Impression, Or Effect, To Be Conveyed: And Here I May As Well Observe That, Throughout The Construction, I Kept Steadily In View The Design.
Views
Choices
Design
It Was Night, And The Rain Fell; And Falling, It Was Rain, But, Having Fallen, It Was Blood.
Fall
Rain
Night
A Fearful Instance Of The Ill Consequences Attending Upon Irascibility - Alive, With The Qualifications Of The Dead - Dead, With The Propensities Of The Living - An Anomaly On The Face Of The Earth - Being Very Calm, Yet Breathless.
Anomalies
Alive
Earth
It Is Impossible To Say How First The Idea Entered My Brain, But, Once Conceived, It Haunted Me Day And Night.
Night
Ideas
Brain
Beauty Is The Sole Legitimate Province Of The Poem.
Beauty
Thoughtful
Scary
Grammar Is The Analysis Of Language.
Writing
Analysis
Language
I Remained Too Much Inside My Head And Ended Up Losing My Mind.
Mind
Losing
Losing My Mind
The Customs Of The World Are So Many Conventional Follies.
World
Folly
Conventional
Children Are Never Too Tender To Be Whipped. Like Tough Beefsteaks, The More You Beat Them, The More Tender They Become.
Children
Tough
Beats
True! - Nervous - Very, Very Nervous I Had Been And Am; But Why Will You Say That I Am Mad?
Mad
Nervous
And Have I Not Told You That What You Mistake For Madness Is But Over-acuteness Of The Sense? --now, I Say, There Came To My Ears A Low, Dull, Quick Sound, Such As A Watch Makes When Enveloped In Cotton. I Knew That Sound Well, Too. It Was The Beating Of The Old Man's Heart. It Increased My Fury, As The Beating Of A Drum Stimulates The Soldier Into Courage.
Mistake
Heart
Men
Believe Only Half Of What You See And Nothing That You Hear.
Truth
Halloween
Believe
The True Genius Shudders At Incompleteness.
Genius
Tension
Incompleteness
And The Raven, Never Flitting, Still Is Sitting, Still Is Sitting...
Ravens
Sitting Still
Nevermore
Tell A Scoundrel, Three Or Four Times A Day, That He Is The Pink Of Probity, And You Make Him At Least The Perfection Of "respectability" In Good Earnest. On The Other Hand, Accuse An Honorable Man, Too Petinaciously, Of Being A Villain, And You Fill Him With A Perverse Ambition To Show You That You Are Not Altogether In The Wrong.
Revenge
Ambition
Men
There Are Some Qualities, Some Incorporate Things, That Have A Double Life, Which Thus Is Made. A Type Os Twin Entity Which Springs From Matter And Light, Envinced In Solid And Shade.
Spring
Light
Quality
Beauty Of Whatever Kind, In Its Supreme Development, Invariably Excites The Sensitive Soul To Tears.
Beauty
Fall
Carpe Diem
If A Man Deceives Me Once, Shame On Him; If He Deceives Me Twice, Shame On Me.
Men
Catchy
Shame
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