"The net of law is spread so wide, No sinner from its sweep may hide. Its meshes are so fine and strong They take in every child of wrong. O wondrous web of mystery ! Big fish alone escape from thee !"

"A brave endeavor To do thy duty, whate'er its worth, Is better than life with love forever And love is the sweetest thing on earth."

"The love of man and woman is as fire To warm, to light, but surely to consume And self-consuming die… But comrade-love is as a welding blast Of candid flame and ardent temperature: Glowing more fervent, it doth bind more fast; And melting both but makes the union sure. The dross alone is burnt—till at the last The steel, if cold, is one and strong and pure."

"I 'd rather be handsome than homely; I 'd rather be youthful than old; If I can't have a bushel of silver I'll do with a barrel of gold."

"Who dreads to the dust returning? Who shrinks from the sable shore, Where the high and haughty yearning Of the soul can sting no more?"

"We meet neath the sounding rafter, And the walls around are bare; As they shout back our peals of laughter It seems that the dead are there. Ho! stand to your glasses steady! 'T is all we have left to prize. A cup to the dead already,— Hurrah for the next that dies!"

"Nor peace nor ease the heart can know Which, like the needle true, Turns at the touch of joy or woe, But turning, trembles too."

"Speech and prose are not the same thing. They have different wave-lengths, for speech moves at the speed of light, where prose moves at the speed of the alphabet, and must be consecutive and grammatical and word-perfect. Prose cannot gesticulate. Speech can sometimes do nothing else."

"The duty of a lyrical poet is not to express or explain, it is to intensify life."

"Because our lives are cowardly and sly, Because we do not dare to take or give, Because we scowl and pass each other by, We do not live; we do not dare to live."

"Finality is death. Perfection is finality. Nothing is perfect. There are lumps in it."

"If I asked her master he'd give me a cask a day; But she, with the beer at hand, not a gill would arrange! May she marry a ghost and bear him a kitten, and may The High King of Glory permit her to get the mange."

"Pultes Scotorum."

"Synthesizing as it does the philosophical accomplishments of fifteen centuries, this book appears as the final achievement of ancient philosophy."

"Curiosity will conquer fear even more than bravery will."

"I would think Until I found Something I can never find; – Something Lying On the ground, In the bottom Of my mind."

"Quid est aliud de philosophia tractare, nisi verae religionis, qua summa et principalis omnium rerum causa, Deus, et humiliter colitur, et rationabiliter investigatur, regulas exponere? Conficitur inde, veram esse philosophiam veram religionem, conversimque veram religionem esse veram philosophiam."

"Sed fortasse quis dixerit: Quomodo omnia, quae sunt, lumina sunt?"

"Nemo intrat in caelum nisi per philosophiam."

"Cum ergo audimus, Deum omnia facere, nil aliud debemus intelligere, quam Deum in omnibus esse, hoc est, essentiam omnium subsistere."

"Auctoritas siquidem ex vera ratione processit, ratio vero nequaquam ex auctoritate. Omnis enim auctoritas, quae vera ratione non approbatur, infirma videtur esse. Vera autem ratio, quum virtutibus suis rata atque immutabilis munitur, nullius auctoritatis adstipulatione roborari indigent."

"Tabula tantum."

"One man stands head and shoulders above his contemporary scholars: head and shoulders, some hold, above the Middle Ages: John Scotus Erigena."

"The starlight of heaven above us shall quiver As our souls flow in one down eternity’s river."

"Come in the evening, or come in the morning; Come when you’re looked for, or come without warning."

"Yet there was round thee such a dawn Of light, ne’er seen before, As fancy never could have drawn, And never can restore."

"If I had thought thou couldst have died, I might not weep for thee; But I forgot, when by thy side, That thou couldst mortal be."

"Go, forget me! why should sorrow O’er that brow a shadow fling? Go, forget me, and to-morrow Brightly smile and sweetly sing! Smile,—though I shall not be near thee; Sing,—though I shall never hear thee!"

"But he lay like a warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him."

"Slowly and sadly we laid him down, From the field of his fame fresh and gory; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory."

"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corse to the rampart we hurried."

"Give me, instead of beauty's bust, A tender heart, a loyal mind, Which with temptation I could trust, Yet never linked with error find."

"It is not Beauty I demand, A crystal brow, the moon's despair, Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand, Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair."

"Half-buried to her flaming breast In this bright tree, she makes her nest, Hundred-sunned Phoenix! when she must Crumble at length to hoary dust!"

"O fast her amber blood doth flow From the heart-wounded Incense Tree, Fast as earth’s deep-embosom’d woe In silent rivulets to the sea!"

"Sweet in her green dell the flower of beauty slumbers, Lull'd by the faint breezes sighing through her hair; Sleeps she and hears not the melancholy numbers Breathed to my sad lute 'mid the lonely air."

"Come then, my bird! For the peace thou ever bearest, Still Heaven's messenger of comfort to me— Come—this fond bosom, O faithfullest and fairest, Bleeds with its death-wound, its wound of love for thee!"

"Everything has an ending: there will be An ending one sad day for you and me, And ending of the days we had together, The good companionship, all kinds of weather."

"When I am laid, am laid in earth, May my wrongs create No trouble, no trouble in thy breast; Remember me, remember me, but ah! forget my fate. Remember me, but ah! forget my fate."

"And silence their mourning With vows of returning But never intending to visit them more. No never, no never, intending to visit them more."

"When, like the rising day, Eileen Aroon! Love sends his early ray, Eileen Aroon! What makes his dawning glow Changeless through joy and woe? Only the constant know!— Eileen Aroon!"

"A place in thy memory, dearest, Is all that I claim; To pause and look back when thou hearest The sound of my name."

"While shepherds watched their flocks by night, All seated on the ground, The angel of the Lord came down, And glory shone around."