"Why should we faint and fear to live alone, Since all alone, so Heaven has willed, we die, Nor even the tenderest heart, and next our own, Knows half the reasons why we smile and sigh?"

"The watchful mother tarries nigh Though sleep have closed her infant's eye, For should he wake, and find her gone, She knows she could not bear his moan."

"Love masters agony; the soul that seemed Forsaken, feels her present God again, And in her Father's arms Contented dies away."

"Give us grace to listen well."

"Sweet is the smile of home; the mutual look When hearts are of each other sure; Sweet all the joys that crowd the household nook, The haunt of all affections pure."

"Soft as Memnon's harp at morning, To the inward ear devout, Touched by light, with heavenly warning Your transporting chords ring out. Every leaf in every nook, Every wave in every brook, Chanting with a solemn voice, Minds us of our better choice."

"As fire is kindled by fire, so is a poet's mind kindled by contact with a brother poet."

"Time's waters will not ebb, nor stay."

"When the shore is won at last, Who will count the billows past?"

"Sprinkled along the waste of years Full many a soft green isle appears: Pause where we may along the desert road, Some shelter is in sight, some sacred safe abode."

"Abide with me from morn till eve, For without Thee I cannot live: Abide with me when night is nigh, For without Thee I dare not die."

"Sun of my soul! thou Saviour dear, It is not night if Thou be near: Oh, may no earth-born cloud arise To hide Thee from Thy servant's eyes!"

"And help us, this and every day, To live more nearly as we pray."

"The trivial round, the common task, Would furnish all we ought to ask."

"When you find yourself, as I daresay you sometimes do, overpowered as it were by melancholy, the best way is to go out, and do something kind to somebody or other."

"The deeds we do, the words we say,— Into still air they seem to fleet, We count them ever past; But they shall last, In the dread judgment they And we shall meet!"

"The voice that breathed o'er Eden, That earliest wedding day, The primal marriage blessing, It hath not passed away."

"Oxford, from the strength of principles shown there, was becoming a rallying point for the whole kingdom. John Keble's assize sermon before the judges against the Latitudinarian government was thought indiscreet and fruitless. But these things were not so."

"He was a tory of the old school, a cavalier, and a lover of the memory of Charles I."

"The following Sunday, July 14th, Mr. Keble preached the Assize Sermon in the University Pulpit. It was published under the title of "National Apostasy." I have ever considered and kept the day, as the start of the religious movement of 1833."

"The Christian Year made its appearance in 1827. It is not necessary, and scarcely becoming, to praise a book which has already become one of the classics of the language. When the general tone of religious literature was so nerveless and impotent, as it was at that time, Keble struck an original note and woke up in the hearts of thousands a new music, the music of a school, long unknown in England. Nor can I pretend to analyze, in my own instance, the effect of religious teaching so deep, so pure, so beautiful."

"The true and primary author of it [the Oxford Movement], however, as is usual with great motive-powers, was out of sight. Having carried off as a mere boy the highest honours of the University, he had turned from the admiration which haunted his steps, and sought for a better and holier satisfaction in pastoral work in the country. Need I say that I am speaking of John Keble?"

"His happy magic made the Anglican Church seem what Catholicism was and is."

"By this you may see who are the rude and barbarous Indians: For verily there is no savage nation under the cope of Heaven, that is more absurdly barbarous than the Christian World. They that go naked and drink water and live upon roots are like Adam, or Angels in comparison of us."

"At present I'm re-reading Traherne's Centuries of Meditations which I think almost the most beautiful book (in prose, I mean, excluding poets) in English."

"Why is this soe long detaind in a dark manuscript, that if printed would be a Light to the World, & a Universal Blessing?"

"Had we not loved ourselves at all, we could never have been obliged to love anything. So that self-love is the basis of all love."

"To think the world therefore a general Bedlam, or place of madmen, and oneself a physician, is the most necessary point of present wisdom."

"The Men! O what venerable and reverend creatures did the aged seem! Immortal Cherubims! And young men glittering and sparkling Angels, and maids strange seraphic pieces of life and beauty! Boys and girls tumbling in the street, and playing, were moving jewels. I knew not that they were born or should die; But all things abided eternally as they were in their proper places."

"The corn was orient and immortal wheat, which never should be reaped, nor was ever sown. I thought it had stood from everlasting to everlasting."

"All appeared new, and strange at first, inexpressibly rare and delightful and beautiful. I was a little stranger, which at my entrance into the world was saluted and surrounded with innumerable joys. My knowledge was Divine. I knew by intuition those things which since my Apostasy, I collected again by the highest reason."

"The world is a mirror of infinite beauty, yet no man sees it. It is a Temple of Majesty, yet no man regards it. It is a region of Light and Peace, did not man disquiet it. It is the Paradise of God."

"You never enjoy the world aright, till the Sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens, and crowned with the stars: and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world."

"As nothing is more easy than to think, so nothing is more difficult than to think well."

"An empty book is like an infant's soul, in which anything may be written. It is capable of all things, but containeth nothing."

"Some unknown joys there be Laid up in store for me."

"Strange is the vigour in a brave man's soul. The strength of his spirit and his irresistible power, the greatness of his heart and the height of his condition, his mighty confidence and contempt of danger, his true security and repose in himself, his liberty to dare and do what he pleaseth, his alacrity in the midst of fears, his invincible temper, are advantages which make him master of fortune."

"Order the beauty even of beauty is, It is the rule of bliss, The very life and form and cause of pleasure."

"A stranger here Strange things doth meet, strange glories see; Strange treasures lodg'd in this fair world appear, Strange all and new to me; But that they mine should be who nothing was, That strangest is of all; yet brought to pass."

"As well as any bloom upon a flower I like the dust on the nettles, never lost Except to prove the sweetness of a shower."

"Far more I feared all company: too sharp, too rude, Had been the wisest or the dearest human voice. What I desired I knew not, but whate'er my choice Vain it must be, I knew."

"The past is the only dead thing that smells sweet."

"If I should ever by chance grow rich I'll buy Codham, Cockridden, and Childerditch, Roses, Pyrgo, and Lapwater, And let them all to my eldest daughter."

"There is nothing at the end of any road better than may be found beside it."

"To envy a man is to misunderstand him or yourself."

"I like to think how easily Nature will absorb London as she absorbed the mastodon, setting her spiders to spin the winding-sheet and her worms to fill in the grave, and her grass to cover it pitifully up, adding flowers—as an unknown hand added them to the grave of Nero."

"I built myself a house of glass: It took me years to make it: And I was proud. But now, alas! Would God someone would break it."

"The flowers left thick at nightfall in the wood This Eastertide call into mind the men, Now far from home, who, with their sweethearts, should Have gathered them and will do never again."

"Yes. I remember Adlestrop – The name, because one afternoon Of heat the express-train drew up there Unwontedly. It was late June."

"I read Edward Thomas for a breath of air."