“This Light inspires, and plays upon
The nose of Saint like Bag-pipe drone,
And speaks through hollow empty Soul,
As through a Trunk, or whisp'ring hole,
Such language as no mortal Ear
But spiritual Eve-droppers can hear.”

—  Samuel Butler (poet)

Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)

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 "This Light inspires, and plays upon The nose of Saint like Bag-pipe drone, And speaks through hollow empty Soul, As …" by Samuel Butler (poet)?
Samuel Butler (poet) photo
Samuel Butler (poet) 81
poet and satirist 1612–1680

Related quotes

Hannah More photo

“… There's a joy,
To the fond votaries of fame unknown,
To hear the still small voice of conscience speak
In whisp'ring plaudit to the silent soul.”

Hannah More (1745–1833) English religious writer and philanthropist

David and Goliath, Pt. I

Rumi photo

“Listen with ears of tolerance!
See through the eyes of compassion!
Speak with the language of love.”

Rumi (1207–1273) Iranian poet

https://twitter.com/wise_chimp/status/1488946174321205253?s=21

Gerard Manley Hopkins photo

“Elected Silence, sing to me
And beat upon my whorlèd ear,
Pipe me to pastures still and be
The music that I care to hear.”

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889) English poet

"The Habit of Perfection", lines 1-4
Wessex Poems and Other Verses (1918)

Sigmund Freud photo

“He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis

Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (1905) Ch. 2 : The First Dream
1900s
Source: Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis
Context: He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.

Donald Rumsfeld photo

“Let's hear it for the essential daily briefing, however hollow and empty it might be. We'll do it.”

Donald Rumsfeld (1932) U.S. Secretary of Defense

Meeting with Media Pool Bureau Chiefs October 18, 2001 http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2001/t10192001_t1018bc.html
2000s

Aurelius Augustinus photo

“For the spiritual power of a sacrament is like light in this way: it is both received pure by those to be enlightened, and if it passes through the impure it is not defiled.”
Spiritalis enim virtus Sacramenti ita est ut lux: et ab illuminandis pura excipitur, et si per immundos transeat, non inquinatur.

Aurelius Augustinus (354–430) early Christian theologian and philosopher

Tractates on the Gospel of John; tractate V on John 1:33, §15; translation by R. Willems
Compare:
The sun, too, shines into cesspools and is not polluted.
Diogenes Laërtius, Lib. vi. section 63
A very weighty argument is this — namely, that neither does the light which descends from thence, chiefly upon the world, mix itself with anything, nor admit of dirtiness or pollution, but remains entirely, and in all things that are, free from defilement, admixture, and suffering.
Julian, in Upon the Sovereign Sun http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/julian_apostate_1_sun.htm, (c. December 362), as translated by C. W. King in Julian the Emperor (1888) - Full text online http://www.archive.org/details/julianemperorco00juligoog
The sun, which passeth through pollutions and itself remains as pure as before.
Francis Bacon, Advancement of Learning, Book II (1605)

“Mathematics, too, is a language, and as concerns its structure and content it is the most perfect language which exists, superior to any vernacular; indeed, since it is understood by every people, mathematics may be called the language of languages. Through it, as it were, nature herself speaks; through it the Creator of the world has spoken, and through it the Preserver of the world continues to speak.”

Christian Heinrich von Dillmann (1829–1899) German educationist

Source: Die Mathematik die Fackelträgerin einer neuen Zeit (Stuttgart, 1889), p. 5.

Joyce Kilmer photo

“Her soul's light shines through,
But her soul cannot be seen.”

Joyce Kilmer (1886–1918) American poet, editor, literary critic, soldier

Main Street and Other Poems (1917), A Blue Valentine
Context: Her soul's light shines through,
But her soul cannot be seen.
It is something elusive, whimsical, tender, wanton, infantile, wise
And noble.

Related topics