Nature

"Now black and deep the Night begins to fall, A shade immense! Sunk in the quenching Gloom, Magnificent and vast, are heaven and earth. Order confounded lies; all beauty void, Distinction lost, and gay variety One universal blot: such the fair power Of light, to kindle and create the whole."

"I was heavy with the even, When she fit her glimmering tapers Round the day's dead sanctities."

"There were once two sisters who were not afraid of the dark because the dark was full of the other's voice across the room, because even when the night was thick and starless they walked home together from the river seeing who could last the longest without turning on her flashlight, not afraid because sometimes in the pitch of night they'd lie on their backs in the middle of the path and look up until the stars came back and when they did, they'd reach their arms up to touch them and did."

"The sky grew darker, painted blue on blue, one stroke at a time, into deeper and deeper shades of night."

"Then awake!—the heavens look bright, my dear! 'Tis never too late for delight, my dear! And the best of all ways To lengthen our days Is to steal a few hours from the night, my dear!"

"I'm going out after supper to walk all over the old orchard by moonlight. I suppose I'll have to go to bed finally... though I've always thought sleeping on moonlight nights a waste of time..."

"Night is the time for rest; How sweet, when labours close, To gather round an aching breast The curtain of repose, Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head Down on our own delightful bed!"

"Darkness now rose, As daylight sunk, and brought in low'ring Night Her shadowy offspring."

"... For now began Night with her sullen wings to double-shade The desert; fowls in their clay nests were couch'd, And now wild beasts came forth, the woods to roam."

"Sable-vested Night, eldest of things."

"Where eldest Night And Chaos, ancestors of nature, hold Eternal anarchy, amidst the noise Of endless wars, and by confusion stand."

"And when night Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine."

"O thievish Night, Why shouldst thou, but for some felonious end, In thy dark lantern thus close up the stars, That nature hung in heaven, and filled their lamps With everlasting oil, to give due light To the misled and lonely traveller?"

"No one but Night, with tears on her dark face, Watches beside me in this windy place."

"I like the night. Without the dark, we'd never see the stars."

"A night of tears! for the gusty rain Had ceased, but the eaves were dripping yet; And the moon look'd forth, as tho' in pain, With her face all white and wet."

"The warm night claimed her. In a moment it was part of her. She walked on the grass, and her shoes were instantly soaked. She flung up her arms to the sky. Power ran to her fingertips. Excitement was communicated from the waiting trees, and the orchard, and the paddock; the intensity of their secret life caught at her and made her run. It was nothing like the excitement of ordinary looking forward, of birthday presents, of Christmas stockings, but the pull of a magnet—her grandfather had shown her once how it worked, little needles springing to the jaws—and now night and the sky above were a vast magnet, and the things that waited below were needles, caught up in the great demand"

"Night...was dense, thicker than the very walls, and it was empty, so black, so immense that within it you could brush against appalling things and feel roaming and prowling around a strange, mysterious horror."

"It was a night so beautiful that your soul seemed hardly able to bear the prison of the body."

"Quiet night, that brings Rest to the labourer, is the outlaw's day, In which he rises early to do wrong, And when his work is ended dares not sleep."

"This is a night for song and sin and drink, for come the morrow, the virtuous and the vile burn together."

"Night is very old, older than the day; night was before day was even a dream in the mind of the creator. Where light and life are, night and death were and will be again."

"It was one of those nights One of those nights When you feel the world stop turning You were standing there There was music in the air I should have been away But I knew I had to stay."

"Night hath a thousand eyes."

"God makes sech nights, all white an' still Fur'z you can look or listen, Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill, All silence an' all glisten."

"And the night shall be filled with music And the cares, that infest the day, Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, And as silently steal away."

"Then stars arise, and the night is holy."

"O holy Night! from thee I learn to bear What man has borne before! Thou layest thy fingers on the lips of Care, And they complain no more."

"I heard the trailing garments of the Night Sweep through her marble halls."

"In the dark I rest, unready for the light which dawns day after day, eager to be shared. Black silk, shelter me. I need more of the night before I open eyes and heart to illumination. I must still grow in the dark like a root not ready, not ready at all."

"People talk about nightfall, or night falling, or dusk falling, and it’s never seemed right to me. Perhaps they once meant befalling. As in night befalls. As in night happens. Perhaps they, whoever they were, thought of a falling sun. That might be it, except that that ought to give us dayfall. Day fell on Rupert the Bear. And we know, if we’ve ever read a book, that day doesn’t fall or rise. It breaks. In books, day breaks, and night falls. In life, night rises from the ground. The day hangs on for as long as it can, bright and eager, absolutely and positively the last guest to leave the party, while the ground darkens, oozing night around your ankles, swallowing for ever that dropped contact lens, making you miss that low catch in the gully on the last ball of the last over."

"Noć je saveznik tužnih ljudi."

"Now Rann, the Kite, brings home the night That Mang, the Bat, sets free— The herds are shut in byre and hut, For loosed till dawn are we. This is the hour of pride and power, Talon and tush and claw. Oh, hear the call!—Good hunting all That keep the Jungle Law!"

"'Tis the witching hour of night, Orbed is the moon and bright, And the stars they glisten, glisten, Seeming with bright eyes to listen— For what listen they?"

"The night cometh when no man can work."

"Night, when deep sleep falleth on men."

"Watchman, what of the night?"

"The whole length of the night is as the day to them, and the coming of darkness is as the rising of the sun by reason of that hope which exalts their hearts and inebriates them by its meditation."

"Then, as he wended his way, by swamp and stream and awful woodland, to the farm-house where he happened to be quartered, every sound of nature, at that witching hour, fluttered his excited imagination: the moan of the whip-poor-will from the hill side; the boding cry of the tree-toad, that harbinger of storm; the dreary hooting of the screech-owl; or the sudden rustling in the thicket of birds frightened from their roost. The fire-flies, too, which sparkled most vividly in the darkest places, now and then startled him, as one of uncommon brightness would stream across his path; and if, by chance, a huge blockhead of a beetle came winging his blundering flight against him, the poor varlet was ready to give up the ghost, with the idea that he was struck with a witch's token."

"At night, to his own dark fancies a prey, He lies like a hedgehog rolled up the wrong way, Tormenting himself with his prickles."

"Now deep in ocean sunk the lamp of light, And drew behind the cloudy vale of night."

"There is a dead spot in the night, that coldest, blackest time when the world has forgotten evening and dawn is not yet a promise. A time when it is far too early to arise, but so late that going to bed makes small sense."

"The smoke ascends In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires Shine and are changed. In the valley Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun Closing his benediction, Sinks, and the darkening air Thrills with the sense of the triumphing night,— Night with train of stars And her great gift of sleep."

"A late lark twitters from the quiet skies: And from the west, Where the sun, his day's work ended, Lingers as in content, There falls on the old, gray city An influence luminous and serene, A shining peace."

"Slowly, gently night unfurls its splendour. Grasp it, sense it, tremulous and tender. Turn your face away from the garish light of day, Turn your thoughts away from cold, unfeeling light, And listen to the music of the night."

"Why are the heavens not filled with light? Why is the universe plunged into darkness?"

"The watch-dog's voice that bay'd the whispering wind, And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind: These all in sweet confusion sought the shade, And fill'd each pause the nightingale had made."

"The longest day at last bends down to evening."

"I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain—and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light."

"The unwelcome November rain had perversely stolen the day's last hour and pawned it with that ancient fence, the night."