A ruddy drop of manly blood The surging sea outweighs, The world uncertain comes and goes; The lover rooted stays.

Never read any book that is not a year old.

To live without duties is obscene.

Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances...Strong men believe in cause and effect.

England's genius filled all measure Of heart and soul, of strength and pleasure, Gave to the mind its emperor, And life was larger than before: Nor sequent centuries could hit Orbit and sum of Shakespeare's wit. The men who lived with him became Poets, for the air was fame.

Nature magically suits the man to his fortunes, by making these the fruit of his character.

If I could put my hand on the north star, would it be as beautiful? The sea is lovely, but when we bathe in it, the beauty forsakes all the near water. For the imagination and senses cannot be gratified at the same time.

Solitude, the safeguard of mediocrity, is to genius the stern friend.

To-day unbind the captive, So only are ye unbound; Lift up a people from the dust, Trump of their rescue, sound!

A creative economy is the fuel of magnificence.

Our chief want in life, is somebody who shall make us do what we can.

For the prevision is allied Unto the thing so signified; Or say, the foresight that awaits Is the same Genius that creates.

Art is a jealous mistress.

Tis very certain that each man carries in his eye the exact indication of his rank in the immense scale of men, and we are always learning to read it. A complete man should need no auxiliaries to his personal presence.

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.

Nor mourn the unalterable Days That Genius goes and Folly stays.

That what we seek we shall find; what we flee from flees from us.

All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

I am not much an advocate for travelling, and I observe that men run away to other countries because they are not good in their own, and run back to their own because they pass for nothing in the new places. For the most part, only the light characters travel. Who are you that have no task to keep you at home? I have been quoted as saying captious things about travel; but I mean to do justice. .... He that does not fill a place at home, cannot abroad. He only goes there to hide his insignificance in a larger crowd. You do not think you will find anything there which you have not seen at home? The stuff of all countries is just the same. Do you suppose there is any country where they do not scald milk-pans, and swaddle the infants, and burn the brushwood, and broil the fish? What is true anywhere is true everywhere. And let him go where he will, he can only find so much beauty or worth as he carries.

None shall rule but the humble, And none but Toil shall have.

You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.

Conversation is an art in which a man has all mankind for his competitors, for it is that which all are practising every day while they live.

If a man own land, the land owns him.

The alleged power to charm down insanity, or ferocity in beasts, is a power behind the eye.

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.

Born for success he seemed, With grace to win, with heart to hold, With shining gifts that took all eyes.

All the great speakers were bad speakers at first.

Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves, but deal in our privacy with the last honesty and truth.

The measure of a master is his success in bringing all men round to his opinion twenty years later.

O tenderly the haughty day Fills his blue urn with fire; One morn is in the mighty heaven, And one in our desire.

Great men, great nations, have not been boasters and buffoons, but perceivers of the terror of life, and have manned themselves to face it.

Leave this hypocritical prating about the masses. Masses are rude, lame, unmade, pernicious in their demands and influence, and need not to be flattered, but to be schooled. I wish not to concede anything to them, but to tame, drill, divide, and break them up, and draw individuals out of them.

Money often costs too much.

Fine manners need the support of fine manners in others.

I wish that life should not be cheap, but sacred. I wish the days to be as centuries, loaded, fragrant.

Fear not, then, thou child infirm, There's no god dare wrong a worm.

As there is a use in medicine for poisons, so the world cannot move without rogues.

I find men victims of illusion in all parts of life. Children, youths, adults, and old men, all are led by one bawble or another. Yoganidra, the goddess of illusion, Proteus, or Momus, or Gylfi's Mocking, - for the Power has many names, - is stronger than the Titans, stronger than Apollo.

The real and lasting victories are those of peace, and not of war.

United States! the ages plead, - Present and Past in under-song, - Go put your creed into your deed, Nor speak with double tongue.

Men are what their mothers made them.

Good is a good doctor, but Bad is sometimes a better.

The manly part is to do with might and main what you can do.

There are always two parties, the party of the Past and the party of the Future: the Establishment and the Movement. At times the resistance is reanimated, the schism runs under the world and appears in Literature, Philosophy, Church, State and social customs.

Our chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do what we can.

He thought it happier to be dead, To die for Beauty, than live for bread.

We may well call it black diamonds. Every basket is power and civilization. For coal is a portable climate. It carries the heat of the tropics to Labrador and the polar circle; and it is the means of transporting itself withersoever it is wanted. Watt and Stephenson whispered in the ear of mankind their secret, that a half-ounce of coal will draw two tons a mile, and coal carries coal, by rail and by boat, to make Canada as warm as Calcutta, and with its comfort brings its industrial power.

There is always a best way of doing everything, if it be to boil an egg. Manners are the happy ways of doing things; each once a stroke of genius or of love, - now repeated and hardened into usage. They form at last a rich varnish, with which the routine of life is washed, and its details adorned.

We are born believing. A man bears beliefs as a tree bears apples.

I think no virtue goes with size; The reason of all cowardice Is, that men are overgrown, And, to be valiant, must come down To the titmouse dimension.