“We are but critics, or but half create,
Timid, entangled, empty and abashed,
Lacking the countenance of our friends.”
Ego Dominus Tuus http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/1478/, st. 4
The Wild Swans at Coole (1919)
Context: We have lit upon the gentle, sensitive mind
And lost the old nonchalance of the hand;
Whether we have chosen chisel, pen or brush,
We are but critics, or but half create,
Timid, entangled, empty and abashed,
Lacking the countenance of our friends.
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W.B. Yeats 255
Irish poet and playwright 1865–1939Related quotes
“Political criticism is our enemies' best friend.”
Newsday, October 20, 2003
2010s, 2016, April, Foreign Policy Speech (27 April 2016)
Letter to John Tyndall (19 April 1851); letter 2411, edited by
Context: I have far more confidence in the one man who works mentally and bodily at a matter than in the six who merely talk about it — and I therefore hope and am fully persuaded that you are working. Nature is our kindest friend and best critic in experimental science if we only allow her intimations to fall unbiased on our minds. Nothing is so good as an experiment which, whilst it sets an error right, gives us (as a reward for our humility in being reproved) an absolute advancement in knowledge.
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 168.
“Is the glass half full, or half empty? It depends on whether you're pouring, or drinking.”
Game Is Not Over - 2005 Oxford Union Address http://www.jeclique.com/onoweb/news-oxfordjune2005.html
“I don't care whether the glass is half full or half empty as long as there's bacon on the plate.”
Source: <i>Bourbon & Bacon</i> (2014), p. 213
