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Quotes by X. Shelley
115 quotations from The Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations (1896), with the subject each one is filed under.
But hope will make thee young, for Hope and Youth Are children of one mother, even Love.— filed under Hope
Affection is a coal that must be cool'd'; Else, suffer'd, it will set the heart on fire. Venus and Adonis. Line 387. Of such affection and unbroken faith As temper life's worst bitterness.— filed under Affection
A lovely lady, garmented in light From her own beauty.— filed under Beauty
Around, around, in ceaseless circles wheeling With clangs of wings and scream, the Eagle sailed Incessantly.— filed under Birds-Falcon
Some say, that ever 'gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long: And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad; The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. Hamlet-Act I. Sc. 1. L. 158. Then my dial goes not true; I took this lark for a bunting. All's Well That Ends Well-Act II. Sc. 5. L. 5. Better than all measures Of delightful sound, Better than all treasures That in books are found, Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!— filed under Birds-Lark
Sound of vernal showers On the twinkling grass, Rain-awakened flowers, All that ever was Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass.— filed under Birds-Lark
Wilt thou have music? hark, Apollo plays, And twenty caged nightingales do sing. Taming of the Shrew. Induction. Sc. 2. L. 37. One nightingale in an interfluous wood Satiate the hungry dark with melody.— filed under Birds-Nightingale
Nightingale. O Nightingale, Cease from thy enamoured tale.— filed under Birds-Nightingale
I could lie down like a tired child, And weep away the life of care Which I have borne, and yet must bear.— filed under Cause
Life may change, but it may fly not; Hope may vanish, but can die not; Truth be veiled, but still it burneth; Love repulsed, -but it returneth.— filed under Change
Men must reap the things they sow, Force from force must ever flow, Or worse; but 'tis a bitter woe That love or reason cannot change.— filed under Change
Nought may endure but Mutability.— filed under Change
I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, From the seas and the streams; I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noonday dreams. From my wings are shaken the dews that waken The sweet buds every one, When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, As she dances about the sun. I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under, And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder.— filed under Clouds
Woe, destruction, ruin, and decay; The worst is death, and death will have his day. Richard II. Act. III. Sc. 2. L. 102. First our pleasures die-and then Our hopes, and then our fears-and when These are dead, the debt is due, Dust claims dust-and we die too.— filed under Death
U. How wonderful is Death, Death and his brother Sleep!— filed under Death
The desire of the moth for the star, Of the night for the morrow, The devotion to something afar From the sphere of our sorrow.— filed under Desire
No change, no pause, no hope! Yet I endure.— filed under Despair
*** then black despair, The shadow of a starless night, was thrown Over the world in which I moved alone.— filed under Despair
The seed ye sow, another reaps; The wealth ye find, another keeps; The robes ye weave, another wears; The arms ye forge, another bears.— filed under Destiny
We rest-A dream has power to poison sleep; We rise-One wandering thought pollutes the day.— filed under Destiny
In an ocean of dreams without a sound.— filed under Dreams
Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine, Yet let's be merry; we'll have tea and toast; Custards for supper, and an endless host Of syllabubs and jellies and mince-pies, And other such ladylike luxuries.— filed under Eating
Lost Echo sits amid the voiceless mountains, And feeds her grief.— filed under Economy
These are two friends whose lives were undivided: So let their memory be, now they have glided Under the grave; let not their bones be parted, For their two hearts in life were singlehearted.— filed under Epitaph
The Pilgrim of Eternity, whose fame Over his living head like Heaven is bent, An early but enduring monument, Came, veiling all the lightnings of his song In sorrow.— filed under Eternity
My grief lies onward, and my joy behind. Sonnet. L. I know The past and thence I will essay to glean A warning for the future, so that man May profit by his errors, and derive Experience from his folly; For, when the power of imparting joy Is equal to the will, the human soul Requires no other heaven. U.— filed under Expression
Thine eyes are like the deep, blue, boundless heaven Contracted to two circles underneath Their long, fine lashes; dark, far, measureless, Orb within orb, and line through line inwoven.— filed under Eyes
Think ye by gazing on each other's eyes To multiply your lovely selves?— filed under Eyes
You lie-under a mistake- For this is the most civil sort of lie That can be given to a man's face, I now Say what I think.— filed under Falsehood
These flowers are like the pleasures of the world. Cymbeline. Act. IV. Sc. 2. L. 296. To strew thy green with flowers; the yellows, blues, The purple violets, and marigolds. Pericles. Act. IV. Sc. 1. L. 15. Faint oxlips; tender bluebells at whose birth The sod scarce heaved.— filed under Flirting
There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, Daisies, those pearled Arcturi of the earth, The constellated flower that never sets.— filed under Flirting
Watches. Watch I. And nearer to the river's trembling edge There grew broad flag-flowers, purple, prankt with white; And starry river buds among the sedge; And floating water-lilies, broad and bright— filed under Flowers-Forget-Me-Not
And the hyacinth purple, and white, and blue, Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew Of music so delicate, soft, and intense, It was felt like an odour within the sense.— filed under Flowers-Honeysuckle
And the wand-like lily which lifted up, As a Mænad, its moonlight-coloured cup, Till the fiery star, which is its eye, Gazed through clear dew on the tender sky.— filed under Flowers-Lily
And the Naiad-like lily of the vale, Whom youth makes so fair and passion so pale, That the light of its tremulous bells is seen, Through their pavilions of tender green.— filed under Flowers-Lotus
And the rose like a nymph to the bath addrest, Which unveiled the depth of her glowing breast, Till, fold after fold, to the fainting air, The soul of her beauty and love lay bare.— filed under Flowers-Rose
Sensitive Plant. Mimosa Pudica. A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew, And the young winds fed it with silver dew, And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light, And clothed them beneath the kisses of night.— filed under Flowers-Safflower
For the Sensitive Plant has no bright flower; Radiance and odour are not its dower; It loves, even like Love, its deep heart is full, It desires what it has not, the beautiful.— filed under Flowers-Safflower
And the violet lay dead while the odour flew On the wings of the wind o'er the waters blue.— filed under Flowers-Violet
the Peri. Broad water-lilies lay tremulously, And starry river-buds glimmered by, And around them the soft stream did glide and dance With a motion of sweet sound and radiance.— filed under Flowers-Violet
Ye gods, it doth amaze me, A man of such a feeble temper should So get the start of the majestic world, And bear the palm alone. Julius Cæsar. Act I. Sc. 2. L. 128. So is Hope Changed for Despair-one laid upon the shelf, We take the other. Under heaven's high cope Fortune is god-all you endure and do Depends on circumstance as much as you.— filed under Fortune
Commerce has set the mark of selfishness, The signet of its all-enslaving power Upon a shining ore, and called it gold; Before whose image bow the vulgar great, The vainly rich, the miserable proud, The mob of peasants, nobles, priests, and kings, And with blind feelings reverence the power That grinds them to the dust of misery. But in the temple of their hireling hearts Gold is a living god, and rules in scorn All earthly things but virtue.— filed under Gold
O heart, and mind, and thoughts! what thing do you Hope to inherit in the grave below?— filed under Gratitude
Dead! The lone couch of his everlasting sleep.— filed under Gratitude
Dark is the realm of grief: but human things Those may not know of who cannot weep for them.— filed under Grief
Winter is come and gone, But grief returns with the revolving year.— filed under Grief
You must come home with me and be my guest; You will give joy to me, and I will do All that is in my power to honour you.— filed under Guests
Ye seek for happiness-alas, the day! Ye find it not in luxury nor in gold, Nor in the fame, nor in the envied sway For which, O willing slaves to Custom old, Severe taskmistress! ye your hearts have sold.— filed under Happiness
Worse than a bloody hand is a hard heart.— filed under Heart
Honour sits smiling at the sale of truth.— filed under Honor
Through the sunset of hope, Like the shapes of a dream, What paradise islands of glory gleam!— filed under Hope
To hope till hope creates From its own wreck the thing it contemplates.— filed under Hope
Last stanza. Worse than despair, Worse than the bitterness of death, is hope. aa.— filed under Hope
O, white innocence, That thou shouldst wear the mask of guilt to hide Thine awful and serenest countenance From those who know thee not!— filed under Insanity
Ay, many flowering islands lie In the waters of wide Agony.— filed under Jealousy
I have drunken deep of joy, And I will taste no other wine to-night.— filed under Joy
As in the soft and sweet eclipse, When soul meets soul on lover's lips.— filed under Kisses
Kiss me, so long but as a kiss may live; And in my heartless breast and burning brain That word, that kiss shall all thoughts else survive, With food of saddest memory kept alive. X.— filed under Kisses
Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, Stains the white radiance of Eternity.— filed under Life
Love's Pestilence, and her slow dogs of war.— filed under Love
Yet all love is sweet Given or returned. Common as light is love, And its familiar voice wearies not ever * * * * * * They who inspire it most are fortunate, As I am now: but those who feel it most Are happier still after long sufferings As I shall soon become.— filed under Love
Man is of soul and body, formed for deeds Of high resolve; on fancy's boldest wing. и.— filed under Man
Thou comest as the memory of a dream, Which now is sad because it hath been sweet.— filed under Memory
MOON (THE). Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, Pale in her anger, washes all the air, That rheumatic diseases do abound : And through this distemperature we see The seasons alter. Midsummer-Night's Dream. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 103. Art thou pale for weariness Of climbing heaven, and gazing on the earth, Wandering companionless Among the stars that have a different birth, - And ever changing, like a joyless eye That finds no object worth its constancy?— filed under Monuments
That orbed maiden, with white fire laden, Whom mortals call the moon. C.— filed under Monuments
The young moon has fed Her exhausted horn With the sunset's fire.— filed under Monuments
Mountains. P. 91. See the mountains kiss high heaven, And the waves clasp one another.— filed under Mountains
Spirit of Nature! all-sufficing Power! Necessity, thou mother of the world!— filed under Necessity
How beautiful this night! the balmiest sigh Which Vernal Zephyrs breathe in evening's ear Were discord to the speaking quietude That wraps this moveless scene. Heaven's ebon vault, Studded with stars, unutterably bright, Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur rolls, Seems like a canopy which love has spread To curtain her sleeping world.— filed under Night
Swiftly walk over the western wave, Spirit of Night!— filed under Night
With hue like that when some great painter dips His pencil in the gloom of earthquake and eclipse.— filed under Occupations-Painting
See the mountains kiss high heaven, And the waves clasp one another.— filed under Ocean
There the sea I found Calm as a cradled child in dreamless slumber bound.— filed under Ocean
The past Hours weak and gray With the spoil which their toil Raked together From the conquest but One could foil.— filed under Patience
Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent; This, like thy glory, Titan! is to be Good, great, and joyous, beautiful and free; This is alone Life, Joy, Empire and Victory.— filed under Philosophy
I consider poetry very subordinate to moral and political science.— filed under Poetry
The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven; And as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name. Midsummer-Night's Dream. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 12. Most wretched men Are cradled into poetry by wrong; They learn in suffering what they teach in song.— filed under Poets
Power, like a desolating pestilence, Pollutes whate'er it touches; and obedience, Bane of all genius, virtue, freedom, truth, Makes slaves of men, and of the human frame A mechanized automaton.— filed under Power
The awful shadow of some unseen Power Floats, tho' unseen, amongst us.— filed under Power
I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, From the seas and the streams; I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noonday dreams.— filed under Rain
The moon of Mahomet Arose, and it shall set: While, blazoned as on heaven's immortal noon, The cross leads generations on.— filed under Religion
O'er Egypt's land of memory floods are level, And they are thine, O Nile! and well thou knowest That soul-sustaining airs and blasts of evil, And fruits and poisons spring where'er thou flowest.— filed under Rivers-Potomac
Kings are like stars-they rise and set, they have The worship of the world, but no repose.— filed under Royalty
We look before and after, And sigh for what is not, Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught: Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.— filed under Sadness
SEASONS (THE). January grey is here, Like a sexton by her grave; February bears the bier, March with grief doth howl and rave, And April weeps-but, O ye hours! Follow with May's fairest flowers.— filed under Sculpture
Idleness. The warm sun is failing, the bleak wind is wailing, The bare boughs are sighing, the pale flowers are dying; And the year On the earth her deathbed, in a shroud of leaves dead, Is lying. Come, months, come away, From November to May, In your saddest array; Follow the bier Of the dead cold year, And like dim shadows watch by her sepulchre.— filed under Sows
Silence! Oh, well are Death and Sleep and Thou Three brethren named, the guardians gloomywinged, Of one abyss, where life and truth and joy Are swallowed up.— filed under Silence
Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung With feigning voice verses of feigning love. Midsummer-Night's Dream. Act I. Sc. 1. L. 30. Sing again, with your dear voice revealing A tone Of some world far from ours, Where music and moonlight and feeling Are one.— filed under Singers
Heaven's ebon vault, Studded with stars unutterably bright, Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur rolls, Seems like a canopy which love has spread To curtain her sleeping world.— filed under Singers
And on their lids *** The baby Sleep is pillowed.— filed under Sleep
Sleep, the fresh dew of languid love, the rain Whose drops quench kisses till they burn again.— filed under Sleep
When, musing on companions gone, We doubly feel ourselves alone. ScoTT-Marmion. Canto II. Introduction. I love tranquil solitude And such society As is quiet, wise, and good.— filed under Solitude
Songs consecrate to truth and liberty.— filed under Sorrow
The air around them Looks radiant as the air around a star.— filed under Spirits
The more we study, we the more discover our ignorance.— filed under Stupidity
Peter was dull; he was at first Dull,-Oh, so dull-so very dull! Whether he talked, wrote, or rehearsed- Still with this dulness was he cursed- Dull-beyond all conception-dull.— filed under Stupidity
For there are deeds Which have no form, sufferings which have no tongue.— filed under Suicide
Those who inflict must suffer, for they see The work of their own hearts, and that must be Our chastisement or recompense.— filed under Suicide
In the warm shadow of her loveliness; - He kissed her with his beams.— filed under Summer
A thought by thought is piled, till some great truth Is loosened, and the nations echo round, Shaken to their roots, as do the mountains now.— filed under Thought
Come near me! I do weave A chain I cannot break-I am possest With thoughts too swift and strong for one lone human breast.— filed under Thought
Strange thoughts beget strange deeds.— filed under Thought
The flood of time is rolling on; We stand upon its brink, whilst they are gone To glide in peace down death's mysterious stream, Have ye done well?— filed under Time
Unfathomable Sea! whose waves are years, Ocean of Time, whose waters of deep woe Are brackish with the salt of human tears! Thou shoreless flood, which in thy ebb and flow Claspest the limits of mortality! And sick of prey, yet howling on for more, thy wrecks on its inhospitable shore, Treacherous in calm, and terrible in storm, Who shall put forth on thee, Unfathomable sea?— filed under Time
Where art thou, beloved To-morrow? When young and old, and strong and weak, Rich and poor, through joy and sorrow, Thy sweet smiles we ever seek, - In thy place-ah! well-a-day! We find the thing we fled-To-day!— filed under To-Morrow
Now all the tree-tops lay asleep, Like green waves on the sea, As still as in the silent deep The ocean-woods may be.— filed under Treason
And in the warm hedge grew lush eglantine, Green cowbind and the moonlight-colored May, And cherry blossoms, and white cups whose wine Was the bright dew yet drained not by the day.— filed under Trees And Plants-Chestnut
Twilight, ascending slowly from the east, Entwined in duskier wreaths her braided locks O'er the fair front and radiant eyes of day; Night followed, clad with stars.— filed under Tyranny
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes.— filed under Wind
O wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?— filed under Wind
A lovely lady garmented in light.— filed under Woman
aa. We know not what we do When we speak words. bb.— filed under Words
Words are but holy as the deeds they cover.— filed under Words
How many a rustic Milton has passed by, Stifling the speechless longings of his heart, In unremitting drudgery and care! How many a vulgar Cato has compelled His energies, no longer tameless then, To mould a pin, or fabricate a nail!— filed under Work
The world's great age begins anew, The golden years return, The earth doth like a snake renew Her winter weeds outworn.— filed under Work