1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), History
Context: The difference between men is in their principle of association. Some men classify objects by color and size and other accidents of appearance; others by intrinsic likeness, or by the relation of cause and effect. The progress of the intellect is to the clearer vision of causes, which neglects surface differences. To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are friendly and sacred, all events profitable, all days holy, all men divine. For the eye is fastened on the life, and slights the circumstance. Every chemical substance, every plant, every animal in its growth, teaches the unity of cause, the variety of appearance.
“Unless we consent to lack the common things which men call success, we shall hardly become heroes or saints, philosophers or poets.”
Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 165
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John Lancaster Spalding 202
Catholic bishop 1840–1916Related quotes
“By common consent, Wolfram is the greatest medieval poet before Dante.”
Victor Duruy (trans. E. H. & M. D. Whitney) The History of the Middle Ages (New York: H. Holt, 1891) p. 338.
Criticism
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 332.
On Lord Castlereagh's use of bribery to pass the Irish Act of Union. Quarterly Review, 111, 1862, p. 204
1860s
Quotations from Gurudev’s teachings, Chinmya Mission Chicago
“To decide to become a philosopher seemed as foolish to me as to decide to become a poet.”
“Money is everywhere but so is poetry. What we lack are the poets.”
"Poets"
I'm a Born Liar (2003)
1910s, Address to Congress: Analyzing German and Austrian Peace Utterances (1918)
Letter to James Laughlin (14 January 1944), published in The Selected Letters of William Carlos Williams (1957) edited by John C. Thirlwall, p. 219
General sources