O. Henry Quotes

You would attain to the divine perfection.

Prayer is innocence's friend; and willingly flieth incessant 'twist the earth and the sky, the carrier-pigeon of heaven.

For 'tis sweet to stammer one letter Of the Eternal's language; - on earth it is called Forgiveness!

They who live in history only seemed to walk the earth again.

Even the blackest of them all, the crow, Renders good service as your man-at-arms, Crushing the beetle in his coat of mail. And crying havoc on the slug and snail.

Mercy more becomes a magistrate than the vindictive wrath which men call justice.

Races, better than we, have leaned on her wavering promise, Having naught else but Hope.

Standing, with reluctant feet, Where the brook and river meet, Womanhood and childhood fleet!

Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies! But beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of love arise.

My designs and labors and aspirations are my only friends.

The picture that approaches sculpture nearest Is the best picture.

Fortune comes well to all that comes not late.

There's not a ship that sails the ocean, But every climate, every soil, Must bring its tribute, great or small, And help to build the wooden wall!

The rapture of pursuing is the prize the vanquished gain.

What shall I say to you? What can I say Better than silence is?

How in the turmoil of life can love stand, Where there is not one heart, and one mouth and one hand.

They, the holy ones and weakly, Who the cross of suffering bore, Folded their pale hands so meekly, Spake with us on earth no more!

The young may die, but the old must!

But the good deed, through the ages Living in historic pages, Brighter grows and gleams immortal, Unconsumed by moth or rust.

Sail on ship of state, sail on, I union, strong and great! Humanity with all its fears, with all its hopes of future years, is hanging on thy fate!

All your strength is in union, all your danger is in discord.

And the bright faces of my young companions Are wrinkled like my own, or are no more.

Evil is only good perverted.

The morning breaks; the steeds in their stalls Stamp and neigh, as the hostler calls; The day returns, but nevermore Returns the traveler to the shore, And the tide rises, the tide falls.

The greatest firmness is the greatest mercy.

Even cities have their graves!

A noble type of good. Heroic womanhood.

There is nothing perfectly secure but poverty.

Sweet April! many a thought Is wedded unto thee, as hearts are wed; Nor shall they fail, till, to its autumn brought, Life's golden fruit is shed.

Bell, thou soundest merrily, When the bridal party To the church doth hie! Bell, thou soundest solemnly, When, on Sabbath morning, Fields deserted lie!

A solid man of Boston; A comfortable man with dividends, And the first salmon and the first green peas.

From labor there shall come forth rest.

The prayer of Ajax was for light.

It is the heart and not the brain, That to the highest doth attain.

I know not how it is, but during a voyage I collect books as a ship does barnacles.

Some poems are like the Centaurs--a mingling of man and beast, and begotten of Ixion on a cloud.

All things are symbols: the external shows Of Nature have their image in the mind , As flowers and fruits and falling of the leaves.

History casts its shadow far into the land of song.

Never idle a moment, but thrifty and thoughtful of others.

The natural alone is permanent.

God is not dead; nor doth He sleep; ... The wrong shall fail, The right prevail, With peace on earth, good will to men.

Many readers judge of the power of a book by the shock it gives their feelings.

Our pleasures and our discontents, Are rounds by which we may ascend.

One, if by land, and two, if by sea; And I on the opposite shore will be, Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm For the country folk to be up and to arm.

In ourselves are triumph and defeat.

I saw the long line of the vacant shore, The sea-weed and the shells upon the sand, And the brown rocks left bare on every hand, As if the ebbing tide would flow no more.

And when the echoes had ceased, like a sense of pain was the silence.

Ah, to build, to build! That is the noblest of all the arts.

The Bible is like a telescope. If a man looks through his telescope, then he sees worlds beyond; but, if he looks at his telescope, then he does not see anything but that.

We not only live among men, but there are airy hosts, blessed spectators, sympathetic lookers-on, that see and know and appreciate our thoughts and feelings and acts.