Henry Wadsworth Longfellow quote: “Books are sepulchres of thought.”

“But strength alone though of the Muses born
Is like a fallen angel: trees uptorn,
Darkness, and worms, and shrouds, and sepulchres
Delight it; for it feeds upon the burrs,
And thorns of life; forgetting the great end
Of poesy, that it should be a friend
To sooth the cares, and lift the thoughts of man.”

John Keats Sleep and Poetry

"Sleep and Poetry", st. 11
Poems (1817)

“Experience is the child of Thought, and Thought is the child of Action. We can not learn men from books.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Book V, Chapter 1.
Books, Coningsby (1844), Vivian Grey (1826)

“my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways" from the book of Isaiah”

Mitch Albom (1958) American author

Source: Have a Little Faith: A True Story

“A NICE THOUGHT
One was a book thief.
The other stole the sky.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Variant: One was a book thief. The other stole the sky.
Source: The Book Thief

“I own a book,' he thought, delighted (Paolini 291).”

Christopher Paolini book Brisingr

Source: Brisingr

“The helpful thought for which you look
Is written somewhere in a book.”

Edward Gorey (1925–2000) American writer, artist, and illustrator

“I thought… that we could at least talk about books.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Prince

Source: Clockwork Prince

“Sultãn Fîrûz Shãh composed a book also in which he compiled an account of his reign and which he named Futuhãt-i-Fîrûz Shãhî…“He writes in its second chapter… ‘Muslim and infidel women used to visit sepulchres and temples, which led to many evils. I stopped it. I got mosques built in place of temples’…”

Nizamuddin Ahmad (1551–1594) historian

Sultãn Fîrûz Shãh Tughlaq (AD 1351-1388)
Tabqãt-i-Akharî

“Sultãn Fîrûz Shãh composed a book also in which he compiled an account of his reign and which he named Futuhãt-i-Fîrûz Shãhî…“He writes in its second chapter… ‘Muslim and infidel women used to visit sepulchres and temples, which led to many evils. I stopped it. I got mosques built in place of temples’…”

Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1309–1388) Tughluq sultan

Sultãn Fîrûz Shãh Tughlaq (AD 1351-1388)
Tabqãt-i-Akharî by Nizamuddin Ahmad.

“In the best books great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours. God be thanked for books.”

William Ellery Channing (1780–1842) United States Unitarian clergyman

"Self-Culture", an address in Boston (September 1838) http://www.americanunitarian.org/selfculture.htm
Context: I have insisted on our own activity as essential to our progress; but we were not made to live or advance alone. Society is as needful to us as air or food. A child doomed to utter loneliness, growing up without sight or sound of human beings, would not put forth equal power with many brutes; and a man, never brought into contact with minds superior to his own, will probably run one and the same dull round of thought and action to the end of llfe.
It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds, and these invaluable means of communication are in the reach of all. In the best books great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours. God be thanked for books. They are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages. Books are true levelers. They give to all, who will faithfully use them, the society, the spiritual presence, of the best and greatest of our race.

“Books are sepulchres of thought.”

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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 202

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