Background Image

...

There Is So Much Wretchedness In The World, That We May Safely Take The Word Of Any Mortal Professing To Need Our Assistance; And, Even Should We Be Deceived, Still The Good To Ourselves Resulting From A Kind Act Is Worth More Than The Trifle By Which We Purchase It.

-Nathaniel Hawthorne

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

There Is So Much

Nathaniel Hawthorne

...

There Is So Much Wretchedness In The World, That We May Safely Take The Word Of Any Mortal Professing To Need Our Assistance; And, Even Should We Be Deceived, Still The Good To Ourselves Resulting From A Kind Act Is Worth More Than The Trifle By Which We Purchase It.

Views: 7

Topic

More From Nathaniel Hawthorne

A Vast Deal Of Human Sympathy Runs Along The Electric Line Of Needlework, Stretching From The Throne To The Wicker Chair Of The Humble Seamstress.

Keep The Imagination Sane--that Is One Of The Truest Conditions Of Communion With Heaven.

Come, Therefore, And Let Us Fling Mud At Them!

You Can Get Assent To Almost Any Proposition So Long As You Are Not Going To Do Anything About It.

Nothing Is More Unaccountable Than The Spell That Often Lurks In A Spoken Word. A Thought May Be Present To The Mind, And Two Minds Conscious Of The Same Thought, But As Long As It Remains Unspoken Their Familiar Talk Flows Quietly Over The Hidden Idea.

There Are Many Things In This World That A Child Must Not Ask About.

The Traveller Knows Not Who May Be Concealed By The Innumerable Trunks And The Thick Boughs Overhead; So That With Lonely Footsteps He May Yet Be Passing Through An Unseen Multitude.

I Cannot Endure To Waste Anything As Precious As Autumn Sunshine By Staying In The House. So I Spend Almost All The Daylight Hours In The Open Air.

A Bodily Disease Which We Look Upon As Whole And Entire Within Itself, May After All, Be But A Symptom Of Some Ailment In The Spiritual Part.

Our Creator Would Never Have Made Such Lovely Days, And Have Given Us The Deep Hearts To Enjoy Them, Above And Beyond All Thought, Unless We Were Meant To Be Immortal.

It Is My Opinion That A Man's Soul May Be Buried And Perish Under A Dung-heap, Or In A Furrow Field, Just As Well As Under A Pile Of Money.

No Fountain So Small But That Heaven May Be Imaged In Its Bosom.

Do Anything, Save To Lie Down And Die!

I Find Nothing So Singular To Life As That Everything Appears To Lose Its Substance The Instant One Actually Grapples With It.

There Is No Season When Such Pleasant And Sunny Spots May Be Lighted On, And Produce So Pleasant An Effect On The Feelings As Now In October.

It [catholicism] Supplies A Multitude Of External Forms In Which The Spiritual May Be Clothed And Manifested.

Selfishness Is One Of The Qualities Apt To Inspire Love.

Let The Attempt Be Made, At Whatever Risk.

There Is Something More Awful In Happiness Than In Sorrow--the Latter Being Earthly And Finite, The Former Composed Of The Substance And Texture Of Eternity, So That Spirits Still Embodied May Well Tremble At It.

'what Is The Unpardonable Sin' Asked The Lime-burner 'it Is A Sin That Grew Within My Own Breast', Replied Ethan Brand 'the Sin Of An Intellect That Triumphed Over The Sense Of Brotherhood With Man And Reverence For God'.

But There Is A Fatality, A Feeling So Irresistible And Inevitable That It Has The Force Of Doom, Which Almost Invariably Compels Human Beings To Linger Around And Haunt, Ghost-like, The Spot Where Some Great And Marked Event Has Given The Colour To Their Lifetime; And, Still The More Irresistibly, The Darker The Tinge That Saddens It.

Let Us Acknowledge It Wiser, If Not More Sagacious To Follow Out One's Day-dream To Its Natural Consummation, Although If The Vision Has Been Worth The Having, It Is Certain Never To Be Consummated Otherwise Than By A Failure.

If Cities Were Built By The Sound Of Music, Then Some Edifices Would Appear To Be Constructed By Grave, Solemn Tones,--others To Have Danced Forth To Light Fantastic Airs.

And What Is More Melancholy Than The Old Apple-trees That Linger About The Spot Where Once Stood A Homestead, But Where There Is Now Only A Ruined Chimney Rising Our Of A Grassy And Weed-grown Cellar? They Offer Their Fruit To Every Wayfarer--apples That Are Bitter-sweet With The Moral Of Times Vicissitude.

My Wife Is - In The Strictest Sense - My Sole Companion, And I Need No Other. There Is No Vacancy In My Mind Any More Than In My Heart.

What We Call Real Estate - The Solid Ground To Build A House On - Is The Broad Foundation On Which Nearly All The Guilt Of This World Rests.

It Is A Little Remarkable, That - Though Disinclined To Talk Overmuch Of Myself And My Affairs At The Fireside, And To My Personal Friends - An Autobiographical Impulse Should Twice In My Life Have Taken Possession Of Me, In Addressing The Public.

Happiness Is Like A Butterfly - The More You Chase, The More Subtle, But If You Stop Moving And Quietly Wait For It To Land On You.

Happiness In This World, When It Comes, Comes Incidentally. Make It The Object Of Pursuit, And It Leads Us A Wild-goose Chase, And Is Never Attained. Follow Some Other Object, And Very Possibly We May Find That We Have Caught Happiness Without Dreaming Of It.

The Sorrow That Lay Cold In Her Mother's Heart... Converted It Into A Tomb.

A Throng Of Bearded Men In Sad-colored Garments And Gray, Steeple-crowned Hats, Intermixed With Women, Some Wearing Hoods, And Other Bareheaded, Was Assembled In Front Of A Wooden Edifice, The Door Of Which Was Heavily Timbered With Oak, And Studded With Iron Spikes.

Love, Whether Newly Born, Or Aroused From A Deathlike Slumber, Must Always Create Sunshine, Filling The Heart So Full Of Radiance, This It Overflows Upon The Outward World.

Just As There Comes A Warm Sunbeam Into Every Cottage Window, So Comes A Lovebeam Of God's Care And Pity For Every Separate Need.

My Heart Was A Habitation Large Enough For Many Guests, But Lonely And Chill, And Without A Household Fire. I Longed To Kindle One! It Seemed Not So Wild A Dream.

Insincerity In A Man's Own Heart Must Make All His Enjoyments, All That Concerns Him, Unreal; So That His Whole Life Must Seem Like A Merely Dramatic Representation.

Who Can Tell Where Happiness May Come, Or Where, Though An Expected Guest, It May Never Show Its Face?

A Screen... The Scenery And The Figures Of Life Were Perfectly Represented, But With That Bewitching, Yet Indescribably Difference, Which Always Makes A Picture, An Image, Or A Shadow, So Much More Attractive Than The Original.

All Brave Men Love; For He Only Is Brave Who Has Affections To Fight For, Whether In The Daily Battle Of Life, Or In Physical Contests.

I Used To Visit And Revisit It A Dozen Times A Day, And Stand In Deep Contemplation Over My Vegetable Progeny With A Love That Nobody Could Share Or Conceive Of Who Had Never Taken Part In The Process Of Creation. It Was One Of The Most Bewitching Sights In The World To Observe A Hill Of Beans Thrusting Aside The Soil, Or A Rose Of Early Peas Just Peeping Forth Sufficiently To Trace A Line Of Delicate Green.

What Would A Man Do, If He Were Compelled To Live Always In The Sultry Heat Of Society, And Could Never Bathe Himself In Cool Solitude?

Man Is A Wretch Without Woman; But Woman Is A Monster-and Thank Heaven, An Almost Impossible And Hitherto Imaginary Monster--without Man, As Her Acknowledged Principal!

Amid The Seeming Confusion Of Our Mysterious World , Individuals Are So Nicely Adjusted To A System, And Systems To One Another And To A Whole, That, By Stepping Aside For A Moment, A Man Exposes Himself To A Fearful Risk Of Losing His Place Forever. (wakefield)

Wherever There Is A Heart And An Intellect, The Diseases Of The Physical Frame Are Tinged With The Peculiarities Of These.

The Fiend In His Own Shape Is Less Hideous Than When He Rages In The Breast Of Men.

Before This Ugly Edifice, And Between It And The Wheel-track Of The Street, Was A Grass-plot, Much Overgrown With Burdock, Pig-weed, Apple-pern, And Such Unsightly Vegetation, Which Evidently Found Something Congenial In The Soil That Had So Early Borne The Black Flower Of Civilized Society, A Prison.

Life Figures Itself To Me As A Festal Or Funereal Procession.

Every Crime Destroys More Edens Than Our Own

Some Illusions...are The Shadows Of Great Truths.

No Author, Without A Trial, Can Conceive Of The Difficulty Of Writing A Romance About A Country Where There Is No Shadow, No Antiquity, No Mystery, No Picturesque And Gloomy Wrong, Nor Anything But A Commonplace Prosperity, In Broad And Simple Daylight, As Is Happily The Case With My Dear Native Land.

If The Truth Were To Be Known, Everyone Would Be Wearing A Scarlet Letter Of One Form Or Another.

Oh, For The Years I Have Not Lived, But Only Dreamed Of Living.

Caresses, Expressions Of One Sort Or Another, Are Necessary To The Life Of The Affections As Leaves Are To The Life Of A Tree. If They Are Wholly Restrained, Love Will Die At The Roots.

The Ideas Of People In General Are Not Raised Higher Than The Roofs Of The Houses. All Their Interests Extend Over The Earth's Surface In A Layer Of That Thickness. The Meeting-house Steeple Reaches Out Of Their Sphere.

Every Individual Has A Place To Fill In The World And Is Important In Some Respect Whether He Chooses To Be So Or Not.

Or-but This More Rarely Happened-she Would Be Convulsed With A Rage Of Grief, And Sob Out Her Love For Her Mother, In Broken Words, And Seem Intent On Proving That She Had A Heart, By Breaking It.

Strength Is Incomprehensible By Weakness, And, Therefore, The More Terrible.

And There I Sat, Long Long Ago, Waiting For The World To Know Me.

Would All, Who Cherish Such Wild Wishes, But Look Around Them, They Would Oftenest Find Their Sphere Of Duty, Of Prosperity, And Happiness, Within Those Precincts, And In That Station Where Providence Itself Has Cast Their Lot. Happy They Who Read The Riddle Without A Weary World-search, Or A Lifetime Spent In Vain!

Women Are Safer In Perilous Situations And Emergencies Than Men, And Might Be Still More So If They Trusted Themselves More Confidingly To The Chivalry Of Manhood.

When An Uninstructed Multitude Attempts To See With Its Eyes, It Is Exceedingly Apt To Be Deceived.

A Human Spirit May Find No Insufficiency Of Food Fit For It, Even In The Custom House.

It Contributes Greatly Towards A Man's Moral And Intellectual Health, To Be Brought Into Habits Of Companionship With Individuals Unlike Himself, Who Care Little For His Pursuits, And Whose Sphere And Abilities He Must Go Out Of Himself To Appreciate.

The Only Sensible Ends Of Literature Are, First, The Pleasurable Toil Of Writing; Second, The Gratification Of One's Family And Friends; And Lastly, The Solid Cash.

Family And Friends

We Must Not Think Too Unkindly Even Of The East Wind. It Is Not, Perhaps, A Wind To Be Loved, Even In Its Benignest Moods; But There Are Seasons When I Delight To Feel Its Breath Upon My Cheek, Though It Be Never Advisable To Throw Open My Bosom And Take It Into My Heart, As I Would Its Gentle Sisters Of The South And West.

Mountains Are Earth's Undecaying Monuments.

The Thing You Set Your Mind On Is The Thing You Ultimately Become.

Law Of Attraction

Great Men Need To Be Lifted Upon The Shoulders Of The Whole World, In Order To Conceive Their Great Ideas Or Perform Their Great Deeds. That Is, There Must Be An Atmosphere Of Greatness Round About Them. A Hero Cannot Be A Hero Unless In An Heroic World.

Shall We Never Never Get Rid Of This Past? ... It Lies Upon The Present Like A Giant's Dead Body.

I Love My Mother, But There Has Been, Ever Since My Boyhood, A Sort Of Coldness Of Intercourse Between Us, Such As Is Apt To Come Between People Of Strong Feelings.

There Is An Alchemy Of Quiet Malice By Which Women Can Concoct A Subtle Poison From Ordinary Trifles.

The Present Is Burthened Too Much With The Past.

Time Flies Over Us, But Leaves Its Shadow Behind.

Nobody Has Any Conscience About Adding To The Improbabilities Of A Marvelous Tale.

Death Was Too Definite An Object To Be Wished For Or Avoided.

I Wonder That We Americans Love Our Country At All, It Having No Limits And No Oneness; And When You Try To Make It A Matter Of The Heart, Everything Falls Away Except One's Native State; -neither Can You Seize Hold Of That, Unless You Tear It Out Of The Union, Bleeding And Quivering.

Salt Is White And Pure - There Is Something Holy In Salt.

We Sometimes Congratulate Ourselves.

Of All The Events Which Constitute A Person's Biography, There Is Scarcely One ... To Which The World So Easily Reconciles Itself As To His Death.

Articulate Words Are A Harsh Clamor And Dissonance. When Man Arrives At His Highest Perfection, He Will Again Be Dumb.

Is It A Fact-or Have I Dreamt It-that, By Means Of Electricity, The World Of Matter Has Become A Great Nerve, Vibrating Thousands Of Miles In A Breathless Point Of Time?

If A Man, Sitting All Alone, Cannot Dream Strange Things, And Make Them Look Like Truth, He Need Never Try To Write Romances.

The Aspect Of The Venerable Mansion Has Always Affected Me Like A Human Countenance, Bearing The Traces Not Merely Of Outward Storm And Sunshine, But Expressive Also, Of The Long Lapse Of Mortal Life, And Accompanying Vicissitudes That Have Passed Within. Were These To Be Worthily Recounted, They Would Form A Narrative Of No Small Interest And Instruction, And Possessing, Moreover, A Certain Remarkable Unity, Which Might Almost Seem The Result Of Artistic Arrangement.

Bees Are Sometimes Drowned In The Honey Which They Collectso Some Writers Are Lost In Their Collected Learning.

Nothing Gives A Sadder Sense Of Decay Than This Loss Or Suspension Of The Power To Deal With Unaccustomed Things, And To Keep Up With The Swiftness Of The Passing Moment. [speaking Of Self-posed Isolation In Old Age.]

Passing Moments

His Stories Are Good To Hear At Night, Because We Can Dream About Them Asleep; And Good In The Morning, Too, Because Then We Can Dream About Them Awake. (cowslip)

The World Owes All Its Onward Impulses To Men Ill At Ease. The Happy Man Inevitably Confines Himself Within Ancient Limits.

Our Most Intimate Friend Is Not He To Whom We Show The Worst, But The Best Of Our Nature.

If Mankind Were All Intellect, They Would Be Continually Changing, So That One Age Would Be Entirely Unlike Another. The Great Conservative Is The Heart, Which Remains The Same In All Ages; So That Commonplaces Of A Thousand Years' Standing Are As Effective As Ever.

She Could No Longer Borrow From The Future To Ease Her Present Grief.

...chillingworth Was A Striking Evidence Of Man's Faculty Of Transforming Himself Into A Devil, If He Will Only, For A Reasonable Space Of Time, Undertake A Devil's Office.

Why Are Poets So Apt To Choose Their Mates, Not For Any Similarity Of Poetic Endowment, But For Qualities Which Might Make The Happiness Of The Rudest Handicraftsman As Well As That Of The Ideal Craftsman Of The Spirit? Because, Probably, At His Highest Elevation, The Poet Needs No Human Intercourse; But He Finds It Dreary To Descend, And Be A Stranger.

America Is Now Wholly Given Over To A D--d Mob Of Scribbling Women, And I Should Have No Chance Of Success While The Public Taste Is Occupied With Their Trash - And Should Be Ashamed Of Myself If I Did Succeed. What Is The Mystery Of These Innumerable Editions Of The Lamplighter, And Other Books Neither Better Nor Worse? - Worse They Could Not Be, And Better They Need Not Be, When They Sell By 100,000.

The Marble Keeps Merely A Cold And Sad Memory Of A Man Who Would Else Be Forgotten. No Man Who Needs A Monument Ever Ought To Have One.

Death Possesses A Good Deal, Of Real Estate, Namely, The Graveyard In Every Town.

Halfway Down A By-street Of One Of Our New England Towns Stands A Rusty Wooden House, With Seven Acutely Peaked Gables, Facing Towards Various Points Of The Compass, And A Huge, Clustered Chimney In The Midst. The Street Is Pyncheon Street; The House Is The Old Pyncheon House; And An Elm-tree, Of Wide Circumference, Rooted Before The Door, Is Familiar To Every Town-born Child By The Title Of The Pyncheon Elm.

But, All This While, I Was Giving Myself Very Unnecessary Alarm. Providence Had Mediated Better Things For Me Than I Could Possibly Imagine For Myself.

Christian Faith Is A Grand Cathedral, With Divinely Pictured Windows. Standing Without, You See No Glory, Nor Can Possibly Imagine Any; Standing Within, Every Ray Of Light Reveals A Harmony Of Unspeakable Splendors.

London Is Like The Grave In One Respect -- Any Man Can Make Himself At Home There; And Whenever A Man Finds Himself Homeless Elsewhere, He Had Better Either Die Or Go To London.

The Christian Faith Is A Grand Cathedral With Divinely Pictured Windows.

It Is To The Credit Of Human Nature, That, Except Where Its Selfishness Is Brought Into Play, It Loves More Readily Than It Hates. Hatred, By A Gradual And Quiet Process, Will Even Be Transformed To Love, Unless The Change Be Impeded By A Continually New Irritation Of The Original Feeling Of Hostility.

Inspirational Love

Human Nature Will Not Flourish, Any More Than A Potato, If It Be Planted And Replanted, For Too Long A Series Of Generations, In The Same Worn-out Soil. My Children Have Had Other Birthplaces, And, So Far As Their Fortunes May Be Within My Control, Shall Strike Their Roots Into Unaccustomed Earth.

Sunlight Is Painting.

There Can Be...no Power...to Disclose...the Secrets That May Be Buried With A Human Heart. The Heart, Making Itself Guilty Of Such Secrets, Must Perforce Hold Them Until The Day When All Hidden Things Be Revealed.

Mankind Are Earthen Jugs With Spirits In Them.

It Is Because The Spirit Is Inestimable, That The Lifeless Body Is So Little Valued.

The Greatest Obstacle To Being Heroic Is The Doubt Whether One May Going To Prove One's Self A Fool.

Last Night, There Came A Frost, Which Has Done Great Damage To My Garden.... It Is Sad That Nature Will Play Such Tricks On Us Poor Mortals, Inviting Us With Sunny Smiles To Confide In Her, And Then, When We Are Entirely Within Her Power, Striking Us To The Heart.

Echo Is The Voice Of A Reflection In A Mirror.

Truth Often Finds Its Way To The Mind Close Muffled In Robes Of Sleep, And Then Speaks With Uncompromising Directness Of Matters In Regard To Which We Practise An Unconscious Self-deception During Our Waking Moments.

Romance And Poetry, Ivy, Lichens And Wallflowers Need Ruin To Make Them Grow.

All Merely Graceful Attributes Are Usually The Most Evanescent.

Moonlight Is Sculpture.

It Is Not Strange That That Early Love Of The Heart Should Come Back, As It So Often Does When The Dim Eye Is Brightening With Its Last Light. It Is Not Strange That The Freshest Fountains The Heart Has Ever Known In Its Wastes Should Bubble Up Anew When The Lifeblood Is Growing Stagnant. It Is Not Strange That A Bright Memory Should Come To A Dying Old Man, As The Sunshine Breaks Across The Hills At The Close Of A Stormy Day; Nor That In The Light Of That Ray, The Very Clouds That Made The Day Dark Should Grow Gloriously Beautiful.

It Is To The Credit Of Human Nature That, Except Where Its Selfishness Is Brought Into Play, It Loves More Readily Than It Hates.

A Pure Hand Needs No Glove To Cover It.

The Calmer Thought Is Not Always The Right Thought, Just As The Distant View Is Not Always The Truest View

Happiness Is Like A Butterfly.

Like A Butterfly

When Individuals Approach One Another With Deep Purposes On Both Sides They Seldom Come At Once To The Matter Which They Have Most At Heart. They Dread The Electric Shock Of A Too Sudden Contact With It.

In This Republican Country, Amid The Fluctuating Waves Of Our Social Life, Somebody Is Always At The Drowning-point.

This Dull River Has A Deep Religion Of Its Own; So, Let Us Trust, Has The Dullest Human Soul, Though, Perhaps, Unconsciously.

As The Architecture Of A Country Always Follows The Earliest Structures, American Architecture Should Be A Refinement Of The Log-house. The Egyptian Is So Of The Cavern And The Mound; The Chinese, Of The Tent; The Gothic, Of Overarching Trees; The Greek, Of A Cabin.

If We Take The Freedom To Put A Friend Under Our Microscope, We Thereby Insulate Him From Many Of His True Relations, Magnify His Peculiarities, Inevitably Tear Him Into Parts, And, Of Course, Patch Him Very Clumsily Together Again. What Wonder, Then, Should We Be Frightened By The Aspect Of A Monster.

Can Man Be So Age-stricken That No Faintest Sunshine Of His Youth May Re Visit Him Once A Year? It Is Impossible. The Moss On Our Time-worn Mansion Brightens Into Beauty; And The Good Old Pastor, Who Once Dwelt Here, Renewed His Prime And Regained His Boyhood In The Genial Breeze Of His Ninetieth Spring. Alas For The Worn And Heavy Soul, If, Whether In Youth Or Age, It Has Outlived Its Privilege Of Springtime Sprightliness!

I Do Detest All Offices - All, At Least, That Are Held On A Political Tenure.

We Are But Shadows: We Are, Not Endowed With Real Life, And All That Seems Most Real About Us Is But The Thinnest Substance Of A Dream,--till The Heart Be Touched. That Touch Creates Us--then We Begin To Be--thereby We Are Beings Of Reality And Inheritors Of Eternity.

Honesty And Wisdom Are Such A Delightful Pastime, At Another Person's Expense!

I Sometimes Fancy," Said Hilda, On Whose Susceptibility The Scene Always Made A Strong Impression, "that Rome--mere Rome--will Crowd Everything Else Out Of My Heart.

I Want Nothing To Do With Politicians. Their Hearts Wither Away, And Die Out Of Their Bodies. Their Consciences Are Turned To India-rubber, Or To Some Substance As Black As That, And Which Will Stretch As Much.

Man's Own Youth Is The World's Youth; At Least He Feels As If It Were, And Imagines That The Earth's Granite Substance Is Something Not Yet Hardened, And Which He Can Mould Into Whatever Shape He Likes.

Yesterday I Visited The British Museum; An Exceedingly Tiresome Affair. It Quite Crushes A Person To See So Much At Once; And I Wandered From Hall To Hall With A Weary And Heavy Heart. The Present Is Burdened Too Much With The Past.

Ugliness Without Tact Is Horrible.

She Poured Out The Liquid Music Of Her Voice To Quench The Thirst Of His Spirit.

My Fortune Somewhat Resembled That Of A Person Who Should Entertain An Idea Of Committing Suicide, And, Altogether Beyond His Hopes, Meet With The Good Hap To Be Murdered.

It Was A Day In Early Spring; And As That Sweet, Genial Time Of Year And Atmosphere Calls Out Tender Greenness From The Ground,--beautiful Flowers, Or Leaves That Look Beautiful Because So Long Unseen Under The Snow And Decay,--so The Pleasant Air And Warmth Had Called Out Three Young People, Who Sat On A Sunny Hill-side Enjoying The Warm Day And One Another.

A Grave, Wherever Found, Preaches A Short And Pithy Sermon To The Soul.

But This Had Been A Sin Of Passion, Not Of Principle, Nor Even Purpose.

I Heard A Neigh. Oh, Such A Brisk And Melodious Neigh It Was. My Very Heart Leapt With The Sound.

In The Depths Of Every Heart, There Is A Tomb And A Dungeon, Though The Lights, The Music, And Revelry Above May Cause Us To Forget Their Existence, And The Buried Ones, Or Prisoners Whom They Hide. But Sometimes, And Oftenest At Midnight, Those Dark Receptacles Are Flung Wide Open. In An Hour Like This, When The Mind Has A Passive Sensibility, But No Active Strength; When The Imagination Is A Mirror, Imparting Vividness To All Ideas, Without The Power Of Selecting Or Controlling Them; Then Pray That Your Grieves May Slumber, And The Brotherhood Of Remorse Not Break Their Chain.

Labor Is The Curse Of The World, And Nobody Can Meddle With It Without Becoming Proportionately Brutalized.

This World Owes All Its Forward Impulses To People Ill At Ease.

Writing Can Come Naturally To Some. Still, When It Comes To Good Writing, This Is True: Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing.

A Man--poet, Prophet, Or Whatever Be May Be--readily Persuades Himself Of His Right To All The Worship That Is Voluntarily Tendered.

Cannot You Conceive That Another Man May Wish Well To The World And Struggle For Its Good On Some Other Plan Than Precisely That Which You Have Laid Down?

How Is It Possible To Sayan Unkind Or Irreverential Word Of Rome? The City Of All Time, And Of All The World!

Thus We See, Too, In The World That Some Persons Assimilate Only What Is Ugly And Evil From The Same Moral Circumstances Which Supply Good And Beautiful Results--the Fragrance Of Celestial Flowers--to The Daily Life Of Others.

Would Time But Await The Close Of Our Favorite Follies, We Should All Be Young Men, All Of Us, And Until Doom's Day.

Methinks It Is A Token Of Healthy And Gentle Characteristics, When Women Of High Thoughts And Accomplishments Love To Sew; Especially As They Are Never More At Home With Their Own Hearts Than While So Occupied.

Some Maladies Are Rich And Precious And Only To Be Acquired By The Right Of Inheritance Or Purchased With Gold.

The Best Of Us Being Unfit To Die, What An Unexpressible Absurdity To Put The Worst To Death.

Families Are Always Rising And Falling In America.

There Is No Greater Bugbear Than A Strong Willed Relative In The Circle Of His Own Connections.

If Human Love Hath Power To Penetrate The Veil--and Hath It Not?--then There Are Yet Living Here A Few Who Have The Blessedness Of Knowing That An Angel Loves Them.

He Had Been Driven Hither By The Impulse Of That Remorse Which Dogged Him Everywhere, And Whose Own Sister And Closely Linked Companion Was That Cowardice Which Invariably Drew Him Back, With Her Tremulous Gripe, Just When The Other Impulse Had Hurried Him To The Verge Of A Disclosure.

The Love Of Posterity Is The Consequence Of The Necessity Of Death. If A Man Were Sure Of Living Forever Here, He Would Not Care About His Offspring.

Death Should Take Me While I Am In The Mood.

We Are As Happy As People Can Be, Without Making Themselves Ridiculous, And Might Be Even Happier; But, As A Matter Of Taste, We Choose To Stop Short At This Point.

A Singular Fact, That, When Man Is A Brute, He Is The Most Sensual And Loathsome Of All Brutes.

To The Untrue Man, The Whole Universe Is False- It Is Impalpable- It Shrinks To Nothing Within His Grasp. And He Himself Is In So Far As He Shows Himself In A False Light, Becomes A Shadow, Or, Indeed, Ceases To Exist.

Life, Within Doors, Has Few Pleasanter Prospects Than A Neatly-arranged And Well-provisioned Breakfast-table.

It Is A Curious Subject Of Observation And Inquiry, Whether Hatred And Love Be Not The Same Thing At Bottom.

What Is The Voice Of Song When The World Lacks The Ear Of Taste?

The World Surely Has Not Another Place Like Oxford; It Is A Despair To See Such A Place And Ever To Leave It, For It Would Take A Lifetime And More Than One To Comprehend And Enjoy It Satisfactorily.

Let The Black Flower Blossom As It May!

When A Writer Calls His Work A Romance, It Need Hardly Be Observed That He Wishes To Claim A Certain Latitude, Both As To Its Fashion And Material, Which He Would Not Have Felt Himself Entitled To Assume Had He Professed To Be Writing A Novel.

Let Men Tremble To Win The Hand Of Woman, Unless They Win Along With It The Utmost Passion Of Her Heart!

In Youth Men Are Apt To Write More Wisely Than They Really Know Or Feel; And The Remainder Of Life May Be Not Idly Spent In Realizing And Convincing Themselves Of The Wisdom Which They Uttered Long Ago.

It Is Not Good For Man To Cherish A Solitary Ambition. Unless There Be Those Around Him, By Whose Example He May Regulate Himself, His Thoughts, Desires, And Hopes Will Become Extravagant, And He The Semblance, Perhaps The Reality, Of A Madman

This Greatest Mortal Consolation, Which We Derive From The Transitoriness Of All Things-from The Right Of Saying, In Every Conjuncture, "this, Too, Will Pass Away.

No, My Little Pearl! Thou Must Gather Thine Own Sunshine. I Have None To Give Thee.

A Hero Cannot Be A Hero Unless In A Heroic World.

Cupid In These Latter Times Has Probably Laid Aside His Bow And Arrow, And Uses Fire-arms -- A Pistol -- Perhaps A Revolver.

The Evening Before My Departure For Blithedale, I Was Returning To My Bachelor-apartments, After Attending The Wonderful Exhibition Of The Veiled Lady, When An Elderly-man Of Rather Shabby Appearance Met Me In An Obscure Part Of The Street.

Not Yet Hardened, Many Young Die Good.

Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing.

The World, That Grey-bearded And Wrinkled Profligate, Decrepit, Without Being Venerable.

But She Named The Infant "pearl," As Being Of Great Price-purchased With All She Had-her Mother's Only Treasure!

Technologies Of Easy Travel Give Us Wings; They Annihilate The Toil And Dust Of Pilgrimage; They Spiritualize Travel! Transition Being So Facile, What Can Be Any Man's Inducement To Tarry In One Spot?

When Scattered Clouds Are Resting On The Bosoms Of Hills, It Seems As If One Might Climb Into The Heavenly Region, Earth Being So Intermixed With Sky, And Gradually Transformed Into It.

The Inward Pleasure Of Imparting Pleasure - That Is The Choicest Of All.

The Heart Of True Womanhood Knows Where Its Own Sphere Is, And Never Seeks To Stray Beyond It!

As The Moral Gloom Of The World Overpowers All Systematic Gaiety, Even So Was Their Home Of Wild Mirth Made Desolate Amid The Sad Forest.

To Be Left Alone In The Wide World With Scarcely A Friend,--this Makes The Sadness Which, Striking Its Pang Into The Minds Of The Young And The Affectionate, Teaches Them Too Soon To Watch And Interpret The Spirit-signs Of Their Own Hearts.

There Is Evil In Every Human Heart, Which May Remain Latent, Perhaps, Through The Whole Of Life; But Circumstances May Rouse It To Activity.

What A Happy And Holy Fashion It Is That Those Who Love One Another Should Rest On The Same Pillow.

As Far As My Experience Goes, Men Of Genius Are Fairly Gifted With The Social Qualities; And In This Age, There Appears To Be A Fellow-feeling Among Them, Which Had Not Heretofore Been Developed. As Men, They Ask Nothing Better Than To Be On Equal Terms With Their Fellow-men; And As Authors, They Have Thrown Aside Their Proverbial Jealousy, And Acknowledge A Generous Brotherhood.

We Do Ourselves Wrong, And Too Meanly Estimate The Holiness Above Us, When We Deem That Any Act Or Enjoyment Good In Itself, Is Not Good To Do Religiously.

The Breath Of Peace Was Fanning Her Glorious Brow, Her Head Was Bowed A Very Little Forward, And A Tress, Escaping From Its Bonds, Fell By The Side Of Her Pure White Temple, And Close To Her Just Opened Lips; It Hung There Motionless! No Breath Disturbed Its Repose! She Slept As An Angel Might Sleep, Having Accomplished The Mission Of Her God.

She Had Wandered, Without Rule Or Guidance, Into A Moral Wilderness... Her Intellect And Heart Had Their Home, As It Were, In Desert Places, Where She Roamed As Freely As The Wild Indian In His Woods... The Scarlet Letter Was Her Passport Into Regions Where Other Women Dared Not Tread. Shame, Despair, Solitude! These Had Been Her Teachers—stern And Wild Ones—and They Had Made Her Strong, But Taught Her Much Amiss.

Life Is Made Up Of Marble And Mud.

Pleasant Is A Rainy Winter's Day, Within Doors! The Best Study For Such A Day, Or The Best Amusement,—call It Which You Will,—is A Book Of Travels, Describing Scenes The Most Unlike That Sombre One

It Is A Curious Subject Of Observation And Inquiry, Whether Hatred And Love Be Not The Same Thing At Bottom. Each, In Its Utmost Development, Supposes A High Degree Of Intimacy And Heart-knowledge; Each Renders One Individual Dependent For The Food Of His Affections And Spiritual Life Upon Another; Each Leaves The Passionate Lover, Or The No Less Passionate Hater, Forlorn And Desolate By The Withdrawal Of His Object.

Words - So Innocent And Powerless As They Are, As Standing In A Dictionary, How Potent For Good And Evil They Become In The Hands Of One Who Knows How To Combine Them.

It Loves More Readily Than It Hates.

Hatred And Anger

She Wanted—what Some People Want Throughout Life—a Grief That Should Deeply Touch Her, And Thus Humanize And Make Her Capable Of Sympathy.

...and We Have So Far Improved Upon The Custom Of Adam And Eve, That We Generally Furnish Forth Our Feasts With A Portion Of Some Delicate Calf Or Lamb, Whose Unspotted Innocence Entitles Them To The Happiness Of Becoming Our Sustenance.

Happiness Is Not Found In Things You Possess, But In What You Have The Courage To Release.

We Dream In Our Waking Moments, And Walk In Our Sleep.

He Whose Genius Appears Deepest And Truest Excels His Fellows In Nothing Save The Knack Of Expression; He Throws Out Occasionally A Lucky Hint At Truths Of Which Every Human Soul Is Profoundly Though Unutterably Conscious.

Eager Souls, Mystics And Revolutionaries, May Propose To Refashion The World In Accordance With Their Dreams; But Evil Remains, And So Long As It Lurks In The Secret Places Of The Heart, Utopia Is Only The Shadow Of A Dream

The Washing Of Dishes Does Seem To Me The Most Absurd And Unsatisfactory Business That I Ever Undertook. If, When Once Washed, They Would Remain Clean For Ever And Ever (which They Ought In All Reason To Do, Considering How Much Trouble It Is), There Would Be Less Occasion To Grumble; But No Sooner Is It Done, Than It Requires To Be Done Again. On The Whole, I Have Come To The Resolution Not To Use More Than One Dish At Each Meal.

Trending Author

Jonathan Carroll

Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

Category