“Science and art may invent splendid modes of illuminating the apartments of the opulent; but these are all poor and worthless compared with the common light which the sun sends into all our windows, which he pours freely, impartially over hill and valley, which kindles daily the eastern and western sky; and so the common lights of reason, and conscience, and love, are of more worth and dignity than the rare endowments which give celebrity to a few.”

Self-Culture (1838)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Science and art may invent splendid modes of illuminating the apartments of the opulent; but these are all poor and wor…" by William Ellery Channing?
William Ellery Channing photo
William Ellery Channing 71
United States Unitarian clergyman 1780–1842

Related quotes

Vitruvius photo
Pablo Neruda photo

“Only with a burning patience can we conquer the splendid City which will give light, justice and dignity to all mankind. In this way the song will not have been sung in vain.”

Pablo Neruda (1904–1973) Chilean poet

Sólo con una ardiente paciencia conquistaremos la espléndida ciudad que dará luz, justicia y dignidad a todos los hombres. Así la poesía no habrá cantado en vano.
Nobel lecture, Hacia la ciudad espléndida (Towards the Splendid City) http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1971/neruda-lecture.html (13 December 1971). In the passage directly preceding these words, Neruda identified the source of his allusion:<p>"It is today exactly one hundred years since an unhappy and brilliant poet, the most awesome of all despairing souls, wrote down this prophecy: 'À l'aurore, armés d'une ardente patience, nous entrerons aux splendides Villes.' 'In the dawn, armed with a burning patience, we shall enter the splendid Cities.' I believe in this prophecy of Rimbaud, the Visionary." (Hace hoy cien años exactos, un pobre y espléndido poeta, el más atroz de los desesperados, escribió esta profecía: "À l'aurore, armes d'une ardente patience, nous entrerons aux splendides Villes". "Al amanecer, armados de una ardiente paciencia, entraremos a las espléndidas ciudades." Yo creo en esa profecía de Rimbaud, el Vidente.)<p>The quotation is from Arthur Rimbaud's poem "Adieu" http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Une_saison_en_Enfer#Adieu from Une Saison en Enfer (1873).

Jacopone da Todi photo
Leonardo Da Vinci photo
Dietrich Bonhoeffer photo
Johannes Kepler photo
Alice A. Bailey photo
Menachem Mendel Schneerson photo

“God gave each of us a soul, which is a candle that He gives us to illuminate our surroundings with His light. We must not only illuminate the inside of homes, but also the outside, and the world at large.”

Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902–1994) Hasidic rabbi

As quoted in Joseph Telushkin's Rebbe: The Life and Teachings of Menachem M. Schneerson, the Most Influential Rabbi in Modern History

Narendra Modi photo
Cat Stevens photo

“Sun is the reason
And the world it will bloom
‘Cause sun lights the sky
And the sun lights the moon”

Cat Stevens (1948) British singer-songwriter

Sun C79
Song lyrics, Buddha and the Chocolate Box (1974)

Related topics