
“Melancholy redeems this universe, and yet it is melancholy that separates us from it.”
Anathemas and Admirations (1987)
Source: Orlando
“Melancholy redeems this universe, and yet it is melancholy that separates us from it.”
Anathemas and Admirations (1987)
“Elysian beauty, melancholy grace,
Brought from a pensive though a happy place.”
Stanza 16.
Laodamia (1814)
“Melancholy is the happiness of being sad.”
“In nature there is nothing melancholy.”
The Nightingale: A Conversation Poem, lines 13-22 (1798).
Context: "Most musical, most melancholy" bird!
A melancholy bird! Oh! idle thought!
In nature there is nothing melancholy.
But some night-wandering man, whose heart was pierced
With the remembrance of a grievous wrong,
Or slow distemper, or neglected love,
(And so, poor wretch! filled all things with himself,
And made all gentle sounds tell back the tale
Of his own sorrow) he, and such as he,
First named these notes a melancholy strain.
Book III, Ch.1
Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793)
“Nothing is more fatal to happiness than the remembrance of happiness.”
Source: The Immoralist