James Russell Lowell Quotes

Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind.

Fate loves the fearless.

The devil loves nothing better than the intolerance of reformers.

All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.

One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning.

Light is the symbol of truth.

A weed is no more than a flower in disguise.

Compromise makes a good umbrella, but a poor roof.

The brain can be easy to buy, but the heart never comes to market.

Each day the world is born anew for him who takes it rightly.

Not what we give, but what we share, for the gift without the giver is bare.

It is right precious to behold The first long surf of climbing light Flood all the thirsty east with gold.

Sincerity is impossible, unless it pervade the whole being, and the pretence of it saps the very foundation of character.

Truth, after all, wears a different face to everybody, and it would be too tedious to wait till all were agreed.

Freedom is the only law which genius knows.

The snow had begun in the gloaming, and busily all the night had been heaping field and highway with a silence deep and white.

Endurance is the crowning quality, And patience all the passion of great hearts.

Thank God every morning when you get up that you have something to do that day, which must be done, whether you like it or not.

The question of common sense is always: 'what is it good for?' - a question which would abolish the rose and be answered triumphantly by the cabbage.

Blessed are they who have nothing to say and who cannot be persuaded to say it.

Folks never understand the folks they hate.

Mishaps are like knives, that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or the handle.

The mind can weave itself warmly in the cocoon of its own thoughts, and dwell a hermit anywhere.

New occasions teach new duties.

Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide.

The dandelions and buttercups gild all the lawn: the drowsy bee stumbles among the clover tops, and summer sweetens all to me.

Our seasons have no fixed returns, Without our will they come and go; At noon our sudden summer burns, Ere sunset all is snow.

Reputation is only a candle, of wavering and uncertain flame, and easily blown out, but it is the light by which the world looks for and finds merit.

New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth; They must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of truth.

Time makes ancient good uncouth.

The time is ripe, and rotten-ripe, for change... [Truth's] mirror is turned forward, to reflect The promise of the future, not the past.

Who's not sat tense before his own heart's curtain.

No man can produce great things who is not thoroughly sincere in dealing with himself.

There is no better ballast for keeping the mind steady on its keel, and saving it from all risk of crankiness, than business.

The greater your real strength and power, the quieter it will be exercised.

Metaphor is no argument, though it be sometimes the gunpowder to drive one home, and imbed it in the memory.

Children are God's Apostles, sent forth, day by day, to preach of love, and hope, and peace.

If we see light at the end of the tunnel, it's the light of the oncoming train.

So we're all right, an' I, for one, Don't think our cause'll lose in vally By rammin' Scriptur' in our gun, An' gittin' Natur' for an ally.

The green grass floweth like a stream Into the oceans's blue.

There is no good in arguing with the inevitable. The only argument available with an east wind is to put on your overcoat.

In the ocean of baseness, the deeper we get, the easier the sinking.

Who speaks the truth stabs falsehood to the heart.

Compromise makes a good umbrella, but a poor roof; it is temporary expedient, often wise in party politics, almost sure to be unwise in statesmanship.

All God's angels come to us disguised.

Let us be of good cheer, however, remembering that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never come.

The traitor to Humanity is the traitor most accursed; Man is more than Constitutions; better rot beneath the sod, Than be true to Church and State while we are doubly false to God.

As life runs on, the road grows strange with faces new - and near the end. The milestones into headstones change, Neath every one a friend.

That best academy, a mother's knee.

The eye is the notebook of the poet.