“Say not "a small event!" Why "small"?
Costs it more pain that this ye call
A "great event" should come to pass
From that? Untwine me from the mass
Of deeds which make up life, one deed
Power shall fall short in or exceed!”
Introduction.
Pippa Passes (1841)
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Robert Browning 179
English poet and playwright of the Victorian Era 1812–1889Related quotes
“Great acts are made up of small deeds.”
“The business of the novelist is not to relate great events, but to make small ones interesting.”
Source: The Works of Schopenhauer: The Wisdom of Life and Other Essays
Source: The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable (2007), p. 8
Why "small"?
Costs it more pain that this ye call
A "great event" should come to pass
From that? Untwine me from the mass
Of deeds which make up life, one deed
Power shall fall short in or exceed!
Introduction.
Pippa Passes (1841)
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.
"Power and Love" (1926)
Context: p> Every morning
I shall concern myself anew about the boundary
Between the love-deed-Yes and the power-deed-No
And pressing forward honor reality.We cannot avoid
Using power,
Cannot escape the compulsion
To afflict the world,
So let us, cautious in diction
And mighty in contradiction,
Love powerfully.</p