“Meadows trim, with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide;
Towers and balements it sees
Bosomed high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps some beauty lies,
The cynosure of neighboring eyes.”
Source: L'Allegro (1631), Line 75
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John Milton 190
English epic poet 1608–1674Related quotes

“Standing, with reluctant feet,
Where the brook and river meet,
Womanhood and childhood fleet!”
Maidenhood http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/longfellow/12212, st. 3 (1842).

“Oh for a seat in some poetic nook,
Just hid with trees and sparkling with a brook!”
Politics and Poetics

Source: The Ordeal of Change (1963), Ch. 11: "Brotherhood"
Context: It is easier to love humanity as a whole than to love one's neighbor. There may even be a certain antagonism between love of humanity and love of neighbor; a low capacity for getting along with those near us often goes hand in hand with a high receptivity to the idea of the brotherhood of men. About a hundred years ago a Russian landowner by the name of Petrashevsky recorded a remarkable conclusion: "Finding nothing worthy of my attachment either among women or among men, I have vowed myself to the service of mankind." He became a follower of Fourier, and installed a phalanstery on his estate. The end of the experiment was sad, but what one might perhaps have expected: the peasants — Petrashevsky's neighbors-burned the phalanstery.
Some of the worst tyrannies of our day genuinely are "vowed" to the service of mankind, yet can function only by pitting neighbor against neighbor. The all-seeing eye of a totalitarian regime is usually the watchful eye of the next-door neighbor. In a Communist state love of neighbor may be classed as counter-revolutionary.

“Many eyes go through the meadow, but few see the flowers in it”