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T. S. Eliot Quotes - Page 20

All Quotes Adventure Age Aging Ambition Appreciation Art Atheism Attitude Awareness Birth Children Choices Christianity Church Coffee Communication Confusion Country Creation Criticism Culture Dance Dancing Darkness Death Desire Destiny Discipline Dying Evil Experience Faith Fear Feelings Fighting Food Funny Genius Giving Graduation Greatness Heart History Home Hope House Humanity Humility Ignorance Imagination Inspiration Inspirational Inspiring Journey Judging Justice Knowledge Labor Language Laughter Life Literature Loneliness Love Lying Meditation Memories Morning Motivational Mountain Music New Beginnings Pain Passion Past Peace Personality Philosophy Poetry Progress Purpose Rain Reading Reality Religion Risk Running Silence Simplicity Singing Soul Spring Struggle Success Suffering Talent Tea Time Tradition Understanding Vision Waiting War Winter Work Writing

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

Strength, Cake, Ice

T. S. Eliot (2014). “The Waste Land and Other Poems”, p.12, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved in her laughter and being part of it, until her teeth were only accidental stars with a talent for squad-drill.

Stars, Laughter, Squad

T. S. Eliot (2012). “The Waste Land, Prufrock and Other Poems”, p.22, Courier Corporation

With Cats, some say, one rule is true: Don’t speak till you are spoken to. Myself, I do not hold with that — I say, you should ad-dress a Cat. But always keep in mind that he Resents familiarity. I bow, and taking off my hat, Ad-dress him in this form: O Cat! But if he is the Cat next door, Whom I have often met before (He comes to see me in my flat) I greet him with an oopsa Cat! I think I've heard them call him James — But we've not got so far as names.

Cat, Thinking, Doors

T.S. Eliot (2015). “The Poems of T. S. Eliot Volume II: Practical Cats and Further Verses”, p.33, Faber & Faber

In my beginning is my end. In succession Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended, Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass. Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires, Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth Which is already flesh, fur and faeces, Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.

Fall, Men, Fire

Four Quartets "East Coker" pt. 1 (1940)

Do not let me hear Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly, Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession, Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God. The only wisdom we can hope to acquire Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

Humility, Men, Endless

1940 Four Quartets,'East Coker', pt.2.

The endless cycle of idea and action, / Endless invention, endless experiment, / Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness; / Knowledge of speech, but not of silence; / Knowledge of words, and ignorance of The Word.

Ignorance, Ideas, Silence

T.S. Eliot (2011). “The Complete Poems and Plays of T. S. Eliot”, p.129, Faber & Faber

If you find examples of humanism which are anti-religious, or at least in opposition to the religious faith of the place and time, then such humanism is purely destructive, for it has never found anything to replace what it has destroyed.

Religious, Example, Found

T. S. Eliot (2014). “Selected Essays”, p.396, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Before a Cat will condescend To treat you as a trusted friend, Some little token of esteem Is needed, like a dish of cream; And you might now and then supply Some caviare, or Strassburg Pie, Some potted grouse, or salmon paste — He's sure to have his personal taste. (I know a Cat, who makes a habit Of eating nothing else but rabbit, And when he's finished, licks his paws So's not to waste the onion sauce.) A Cat's entitled to expect These evidences of respect. And so in time you reach your aim, And finally call him by his name.

Cat, Names, Pie

T.S. Eliot (2011). “The Complete Poems and Plays of T. S. Eliot”, p.216, Faber & Faber

Cats must have three names-an everyday name, such as Peter; a more particular, dignified name, such as Quaxo, Bombalurina, or Jellylorum; and, thirdly, the name the cat thinks up for himself, his deep and inscrutable singular Name.

Cat, Thinking, Names

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is.

Dance, World, Flesh

Four Quartets "Burnt Norton" pt. 2 (1936)

If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent If the unheard, unspoken Word is unspoken, unheard; Still is the spoken word, the Word unheard, The Word without a word, the Word within The world and for the world; And the light shone in the darkness and Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled About the center of the silent Word. Oh my people, what have I done unto thee. Where shall the word be found, where shall the word Resound? Not here, there is not enough silence

Light, People, Silence

[On The Waste Land:] Various critics have done me the honor to interpret the poem in terms of criticism of the contemporary world, have considered it, indeed, as an important bit of social criticism. To me it was only the relief of a personal and wholly insignificant grouse against life; it is just a piece of rhythmical grumbling.

Land, Honor, Criticism

Quoted in The Waste Land, ed. Valerie Eliot (1971)

Anecdote: It is by no means self-evident that human beings are most real when most violently excited; violent physical passions do not in themselves differentiate men from each other, but rather tend to reduce them to the same state.

Real, Passion, Mean

We shall not cease from exploration

Nature, Exploration, Cease

Four Quartets "Little Gidding" pt. 5 (1942)

Why should men love the Church? Why should they love her laws? She tells them of Life and Death, and of all that they would forget.

Men, Law, Life And Death

T. S. Eliot (2014). “Complete Poems and Plays, 1909-1950”, p.115, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.

Death, Communication, Fire

Four Quartets "Little Gidding" pt. 1 (1942)

Here I am, an old man in a dry month, Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.

Rain, Boys, Men

"Gerontion" l. 1 (1920)

All dash to and fro in motor cars. Familiar with the roads and settled nowhere.

Car, Familiar, Motor Cars

T.S. Eliot (2011). “The Complete Poems and Plays of T. S. Eliot”, p.134, Faber & Faber

Paint me the bold anfractuous rocks Faced by the snarled and yelping seas.

Rocks, Sea, Paint

T.S. Eliot (2009). “Collected Poems 1909-1962”, p.35, Faber & Faber

A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.

Time, Winter, Journey

"Journey of the Magi" l. 1 (1927)

I think it was rather an advantage not having any living poets in England or America in whom one took any particular interest. I don't know what it would be like but I think it would be a rather troublesome distraction to have such a lot of dominating presences, as you call them, about. Fortunately we weren't bothered by each other.

Thinking, America, Poetry

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap And seeing that it was a soft October night Curled once about the house, and fell asleep

Fall, Night, Fog

T.S. Eliot (2011). “The Complete Poems and Plays of T. S. Eliot”, p.7, Faber & Faber

A toothache, or a violent passion, is not necessarily diminished by our knowledge of its causes, its character, its importance or insignificance.

Passion, Character, Causes

"Knowledge and Experience in the Philosophy of F.H. Bradley". Doctoral dissertation in philosophy; submitted to Harvard, ch. 1, 1916.

Tennyson and Browning are poets, and they think; but they do not feel their thought as immediately as the odour of a rose. A thought to Donne was an experience; it modified his sensibility.

Thinking, Rose, Poet

T. S. Eliot (2014). “Selected Essays”, p.256, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

There will be time to murder and create.

Time, Window Panes, Murder

T. S. Eliot (2014). “The Waste Land and Other Poems”, p.10, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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