Peter was dull; he was at first Dull; – Oh, so dull – so very dull! Whether he talked, wrote, or rehearsed – Still with his dulness was he cursed – Dull -beyond all conception – dull.
Of Planets, struggling fierce towards heaven’s free wilderness.
Duty and dereliction guide thee back to solitude.
The Pilgrim of Eternity, whose fame Over his living head like heaven is bent, An early but enduring monument, Came, veiling all the lightnings of his song In sorrow.
All love is sweet, given or received...
We look before and after, And pine for what is not; Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught; Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
Poetry is the record of the best and happiest moments of the happiest and best minds.
Revenge is the naked idol of the worship of a semi-barbarous age.
Concerning God, freewill and destiny: Of all that earth has been or yet may be, all that vain men imagine or believe, or hope can paint or suffering may achieve, we descanted.
Obscenity, which is ever blasphemy against the divine beauty in life, is a monster for which the corruption of society forever brings forth new food, which it devours in secret.
I fall upon the thorns of life...
The cloud of mind is discharging its collected lightning.
As long as skies are blue, and fields are green Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow, Month follow month with woe, and year wake year to sorrow.
Is it not odd that the only generous person I ever knew, who had money to be generous with, should be a stockbroker.
Love is free; to promise for ever to love the same woman is not less absurd than to promise to believe the same creed; such a vow in both cases excludes us from all inquiry.
The pleasure that is in sorrow is sweeter than the pleasure of pleasure itself.
Man has no right to kill his brother. It is no excuse that he does so in uniform: he only adds the infamy of servitude to the crime of murder.
Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return. Such recurrences should not constitute occasions for sadness but realities for awareness, so that one may be happy in the interim.
Government is an evil; it is only the thoughtlessness and vices of men that make it a necessary evil. When all men are good and wise, government will of itself decay.
In a drama of the highest order there is little food for censure or hatred; it teaches rather self-knowledge and self-respect.