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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Quotes about Life

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If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Inspiring, Sympathy
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1872). “Outre Mer. Driftwood”

Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Happiness, Sad

Look not mournfully into the past, it comes not back again. Wisely improve the present, it is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future without fear and with a manly heart.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Inspirational, Life, Wisdom
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Illustrated)”, p.2016, Delphi Classics

Each day is a branch of the Tree of Life laden heavily with fruit. If we lie down lazily beneath it, we may starve; but if we shake the branches, some of the fruit will fall for us.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Lying, Fall
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1888). “Longfellow's Days: The Longfellow Prose Birthday Book : Extracts from the Journals and Letters of H. W. Longfellow”

It is difficult to know at what moment love begins; it is less difficult to know that it has begun.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Love, Life, Confused
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Illustrated)”, p.2083, Delphi Classics

Give what you have. To some one, it may be better than you dare to think.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Inspirational, Life, Kindness
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1854). “The Works of Henry W. Longfellow”

Live up to the best that is in you: Live noble lives, as you all may, in whatever condition you may find yourselves.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Self Improvement, Noble

Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Change, Sympathy
"A Psalm of Life" st. 7 (1838)

Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; Dust thou art, to dust returnest, Was not spoken of the soul.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Death, Art
"A Psalm of Life" st. 1 - 2 (1838)

In the life of every man there are sudden transitions of feeling, which seem almost miraculous. At once, as if some magician had touched the heavens and the earth, the dark clouds melt into the air, the wind falls, and serenity succeeds the storm. The causes which produce these changes may have been long at work within us, but the changes themselves are instantaneous, and apparently without sufficient cause.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Fall, Dark
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Nathaniel Hawthorne, James Russell Lowell, John Greenleaf Whittier, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1850). “The Boston book: being specimens of metropolitan literature”, p.362

There is no death! What seems so is transition; this life of mortal breath is but a suburb of the life elysian, whose portal we call Death.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Inspirational, Life, Death
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1871). “The Poetical Works”, p.134

Thus at the flaming forge of life Our fortunes must be wrought; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped Each burning deed and thought!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Burning, Deeds
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1871). “The Poetical Works”, p.37

Gone are the living, but the dead remain, And not neglected; for a hand unseen, Scattering its bounty like a summer rain, Still keeps their graves and their remembrance green.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Summer, Tombstone
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1859). “The Complete Poetical Works”, p.607

Quotes about Life Tell me not, in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream! For the soul is dead that slumbers, and things are not what they seem. Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; Dust thou art; to dust returnest, Was not spoken of the soul.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Death, Dream
"A Psalm of Life" st. 1 - 2 (1838)

Art is long, and time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating Funeral marches to the grave.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Time, Art
"A Psalm of Life" st. 4 (1838)

Does not all the blood within me Leap to meet thee, leap to meet thee, As the springs to meet the sunshine.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Spring, Sunshine
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, J. D. McClatchy (2000). “Poems and Other Writings”, p.209, Library of America

It has done me good to be somewhat parched by the heat and drenched by the rain of life.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Gratitude, Rain
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1857). “Prose Works”, p.94

Ah, how skillful grows the hand That obeyeth Love's command! It is the heart, and not the brain, That to the highest doth attain, And he who followeth Love's behest Far excelleth all the rest!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Heart, Hands
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1867). “The Poetical Works of H. W. Longfellow. Complete Edition”, p.127

Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing, only a signal shown, and a distant voice in the darkness; So on the ocean of life, we pass and speak one another, only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Sad, Depressing
Tales of aWayside Inn pt. 3 "The Theologian's Tale: Elizabeth" pt. 4 (1874)

That was the first sound in the song of love! Scarce more than silence is, and yet a sound. Hands of invisible spirits touch the strings Of that mysterious instrument, the soul, And play the prelude of our fate. We hear The voice prophetic, and are not alone.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Song, Fate
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1872). “The poetical works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Author's complete ed”, p.108

There is nothing holier in this life of ours than the first consciousness of love, the first fluttering of its silken wings.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Love, Life, Wings
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Illustrated)”, p.1961, Delphi Classics

Love makes its record in deeper colors as we grow out of childhood into manhood; as the Emperors signed their names in green ink when under age, but when of age, in purple.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Color, Names
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1873). “Prose Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow”, p.454

Life is the gift of God, and is divine.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Life Is, Divine
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Illustrated)”, p.807, Delphi Classics

Like a French poem is life; being only perfect in structure when with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Masculine And Feminine, Perfect
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Illustrated)”, p.1061, Delphi Classics

Learn to labour and to wait.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Life, Waiting, Labour
'A Psalm of Life' (1838).

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