William Morris: Quotes about the world

William Morris was author, designer, and craftsman. Explore interesting quotes on world.
William Morris: 238   quotes 5   likes

“Love is enough: though the World be a-waning
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining”

William Morris

Love is Enough (1872), Song I : Though the World Be A-Waning
Context: Love is enough: though the World be a-waning
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining,
Though the sky be too dark for dim eyes to discover
The gold-cups and daisies fair blooming thereunder,
Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter;
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter
These lips and these eyes of the loved and the lover.

Love , World

“Your hearts make all plain in the best wise they would
And the world ye thought waning is glorious and good…”

William Morris

Love is Enough (1872), Song II: Have No Thought for Tomorrow
Context: Till again shall the change come, and words your lips say not
Your hearts make all plain in the best wise they would
And the world ye thought waning is glorious and good...

World , Heart

“Go back again, now you have seen us, and your outward eyes have learned that in spite of all the infallible maxims of your day there is yet a time of rest in store for the world, when mastery has changed into fellowship — but not before.”

William Morris book News from Nowhere

News from Nowhere (1890)
Context: Go back again, now you have seen us, and your outward eyes have learned that in spite of all the infallible maxims of your day there is yet a time of rest in store for the world, when mastery has changed into fellowship — but not before. Go back again, then, and while you live you will see all round you people engaged in making others live lives which are not their own, while they themselves care nothing for their own real lives — men who hate life though they fear death. Go back and be the happier for having seen us, for having added a little hope to your struggle. Go on living while you may, striving, with whatsoever pain and labour needs must be, to build up little by little the new day of fellowship, and rest, and happiness.

World , Learning , Change , Time

“Mastership hath many shifts whereby it striveth to keep itself alive in the world.”

William Morris book A Dream of John Ball

Source: A Dream of John Ball (1886), Ch. 12: Ill Would Change Be At Whiles Were It Not For The Change Beyond The Change.
Context: Mastership hath many shifts whereby it striveth to keep itself alive in the world. And now hear a marvel: whereas thou sayest these two times that out of one man ye may get but one man's work, in days to come one man shall do the work of a hundred men — yea, of a thousand or more: and this is the shift of mastership that shall make many masters and many rich men.

World

“When the dead, and their deeds that die not shall awaken,
And the world's tale shall sound in your trumpet of warning,
And the sun smite the banner called Scorn of the Scorning,
And dead pain ye shall trample, dead fruitless desire,
As ye wend to pluck out the new world from the fire.”

William Morris

Love is Enough (1872), Song VI: Cherish Life that Abideth
Context: Live on, for Love liveth, and earth shall be shaken
By the wind of his wings on the triumphing morning,
When the dead, and their deeds that die not shall awaken,
And the world's tale shall sound in your trumpet of warning,
And the sun smite the banner called Scorn of the Scorning,
And dead pain ye shall trample, dead fruitless desire,
As ye wend to pluck out the new world from the fire.

Pain , World , Sun , Dead

“With the arrogance of youth, I determined to do no less than to transform the world with Beauty. If I have succeeded in some small way, if only in one small corner of the world, amongst the men and women I love, then I shall count myself blessed, and blessed, and blessed, and the work goes on.”

William Morris

As quoted in William Morris & Red House (2005) by Jan Marsh, p. 65.

Love , Women , Men , Youth

“The wanderer trembled when he saw all this,
Because he deemed by magic it was wrought;
Yet in his heart a longing for some bliss
Whereof the hard and changing world knows nought,
Arose and urged him on, and dimmed the thought
That there perchance some devil lurked to slay
The heedless wanderer from the light of day”

William Morris

The Earthly Paradise (1868-70), The Lady of the Land

World , Light , Change , Heart

“O hearken the words of his voice of compassion:
"Come cling round about me, ye faithful who sicken
Of the weary unrest and the world's passing fashions!
As the rain in mid-morning your troubles shall thicken,
But surely within you some Godhead doth quicken,
As ye cry to me heeding, and leading you home."”

William Morris

Love is Enough (1872), Song IX: Ho Ye Who Seek Saving

World , Faith , Home , Fashion

“Drowsy I lie, no folk at my command,
Who once was called the Lady of the Land;
Who might have bought a kingdom with a kiss,
Yea, half the world with such a sight as this.”

William Morris

The Earthly Paradise (1868-70), The Lady of the Land

Lie , World , Kiss

“O surely this morning all sorrow is hidden,
All battle is hushed for this even at least;
And no one this noontide may hunger, unbidden
To the flowers and the singing and the joy of your feast
Where silent ye sit midst the world's tale increased.”

William Morris

Love is Enough (1872), Song II: Have No Thought for Tomorrow

Hunger , World , Flowers , Singing

“A world made to be lost, —
A bitter life 'twixt pain and nothing tost.”

William Morris

"The Hill of Venus".
The Earthly Paradise (1868-70)

Life , Pain , World

“When we can get beyond that smoky world, there, out in the country we may still see the works of our fathers yet alive amidst the very nature they were wrought into, and of which they are so completely a part: for there indeed if anywhere, in the English country, in the days when people cared about such things, was there a full sympathy between the works of man, and the land they were made for: — the land is a little land; too much shut up within the narrow seas, as it seems, to have much space for swelling into hugeness: there are no great wastes overwhelming in their dreariness, no great solitudes of forests, no terrible untrodden mountain-walls: all is measured, mingled, varied, gliding easily one thing into another: little rivers, little plains, swelling, speedily- changing uplands, all beset with handsome orderly trees; little hills, little mountains, netted over with the walls of sheep- walks: all is little; yet not foolish and blank, but serious rather, and abundant of meaning for such as choose to seek it: it is neither prison nor palace, but a decent home.”

William Morris

The Decorative Arts (1877)

People , World , Home , Mountain

“I love art, and I love history, but it is living art and living history that I love... It is in the interest of living art and living history that I oppose so-called restoration. What history can there be in a building bedaubed with ornament, which cannot at the best be anything but a hopeless and lifeless imitation of the hope and vigour of the earlier world?”

William Morris

"The History of Pattern-Designing" lecture (1882) The Collected Works of William Morris (1910 - 1915) Vol. 22

History , World , Love , Making love