Authors:

James Russell Lowell Quotes - Page 16

All Quotes Age Ambition Atheism Belief Bravery Character Charity Children Choices Christ Church Compromise Conscience Country Crime Criticism Death Democracy Desire Destiny Devil Duty Earth Education Evil Experience Failing Failure Faith Fame Fate Fear Freedom Funny Genius Giving Glory God Gold Grief Happiness Heart Heaven Human Nature Humanity Imagination Inspirational Knowledge Liberty Life Literature Love Lying Memories Morality Nature Originality Passion Past Peace Poetry Praise Pride Progress Quality Rain Reading Reality Religion Running Silence Simplicity Society Son Sorrow Soul Spring Style Success Summer Time Tradition Truth Tyranny Victory Waiting War Weakness Wealth Weed Wisdom Work Writing Youth
A friendship counting nearly forty years is the finest kind of shade-tree I know.

A friendship counting nearly forty years is the finest kind of shade-tree I know.

James Russell Lowell
Funny, Friendship, Meaningful
James Russell Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton (1904). “Letters”

God'll send the bill to you.

James Russell Lowell
God, Bills
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.184

A ginooine statesman should be on his guard, if he must hev beliefs, not to b'lieve 'em too hard.

James Russell Lowell
Ems, Belief, Politician

All free governments, whatever their name, are in reality governments by public opinion ; and it is on the quality of this public opinion that their prosperity depends. It is, therefore, their first duty to purify the element from which they draw the breath of life.

James Russell Lowell
Reality, Government, Names
James Russell Lowell (1910). “Essays, English and American”

For Humanity sweeps onward: where today the martyr stands, On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands; Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling fagots burn, While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return To glean up the scattered ashes into History's golden urn.

James Russell Lowell
Yesterday, Hands, Humanity
James Russell Lowell (2016). “Delphi Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell (Illustrated)”, p.190, Delphi Classics

It is not a great Xerxes army of words, but a compact Greek ten thousand that march safely down to posterity.

James Russell Lowell
Army, Greek, March
James Russell Lowell (1870). “Among My Books: First [-second] series”, p.239

Nature, they say, doth dote, And cannot make a man Save on some worn-out plan Repeating us by rote: For him her Old World moulds aside she threw And, choosing sweet clay from the breast Of the unexhausted West, With stuff untainted shaped a hero new.

James Russell Lowell
Sweet, Hero, Men
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.431

Life is the jailer, death the angel sent to draw the unwilling bolts and set us free.

James Russell Lowell
Death, Angel, Dying
James Russell Lowell (1861). “Poetical Works”, p.202

But life is sweet, though all that makes it sweet. Lessen like sound of friends departing feet; And death is beautiful as feet of friend. Coming with welcome at our journey's end.

James Russell Lowell
Beautiful, Death, Sweet
James Russell Lowell (2016). “Delphi Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell (Illustrated)”, p.861, Delphi Classics

When I was a beggarly boy, And lived in a cellar damp, I had not a friend nor a toy, But I had Aladdin's lamp.

James Russell Lowell
Friends, Boys, Lamps
James Russell Lowell (1873). “The Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell”, p.387

A father of the church said that property was theft, many centuries before Proudhon was born. Bourdaloue reaffirmed it. Montesquieu was the inventor of national workshops and of the theory that the state owed every man a living. Nay, was not the church herself the first organized democracy?

James Russell Lowell
Father, Men, Church
James Russell Lowell (1889). “Books and Libraries: Democracy, and Other Papers”

There is no work of genius which has not been the delight of mankind, no word of genius to which the human heart and soul have not sooner or later responded.

James Russell Lowell
Heart, Soul, Genius
James Russell Lowell (1870). “Among my Books, etc”, p.357

Great truths are portions of the soul of man; Great souls are portions of eternity.

James Russell Lowell
Men, Soul, Eternity
James Russell Lowell (1861). “Poetical Works”, p.244

Not but wut abstract war is horrid, I sign to thet with all my heart, But civilysation doos git forrid Sometimes, upon a powder-cart.

James Russell Lowell
War, Heart, Sometimes

Take winter as you find him, and he turns out to be a thoroughly honest fellow; with no nonsense in him, which is a great comfort in the long-run.

James Russell Lowell
Running, Winter, Long
James Russell Lowell (1871). “My Study Windows”, p.21

Some day the soft Ideal that we wooed confronts us fiercely, foe-beset, pursued, and cries reproachful: Was it then my praise, and not myself was loved? Prove now thy truth; I claim of thee the promise of thy youth.

James Russell Lowell
Love, Promise, Youth
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.431

He's true to God who's true to man.

James Russell Lowell
Men
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.82

It ["The Ancient Mariner"] is marvellous in its mastery over that delightfully fortuitous inconsequence that is the adamantine logic of dreamland.

James Russell Lowell
Poetry, Mastery, Logic
James Russell Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton (1904). “The Complete Writings of James Russell Lowell”

You've gut to git up airly Ef you want to take in God.

James Russell Lowell
Want, Guts
'The Biglow Papers' (First Series, 1848) no. 1 'A Letter'

The traitor to Humanity is the traitor most accurst.

James Russell Lowell
Humanity, Traitor, Treason
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.82

Never did Poesy appear So full of heaven to me, as when I saw how it would pierce through pride and fear To the lives of coarsest men.

James Russell Lowell
Pride, Men, Poetry
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.40

The gift without the giver is rare.

James Russell Lowell
Thank You, Generosity, Giving

A nature wise With finding in itself the types of all, With watching from the dim verge of the time What things to be are visible in the gleams Thrown forward on them from the luminous past, Wise with the history of its own frail heart, With reverence and sorrow, and with love, Broad as the world, for freedom and for man.

James Russell Lowell
Wise, Heart, Character
James Russell Lowell (1857). “Miscellaneous poems. Memorial verses. Sonnets. I-XXVII. L'Envoi. Vision of Sir Launfal”, p.81

The pine is the mother of legends.

James Russell Lowell
Mother, Legends
James Russell Lowell (1871). “The poetical works of James Russell Lowell”, p.73

Sorrow is the great idealizer.

James Russell Lowell
Grief, Sorrow, Great Idea

You May Also Like: