WIST Quotations

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “A Psalm of Life” (1838)

Dave — Wed, 14 Jan 2015 16:58:15 +0000

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“A Psalm of Life” (1838)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “A Psalm of Life”, 3, Voices of the Night (1839)

Dave — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 16:46:25 +0000

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each tomorrow
Find us farther than today.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“A Psalm of Life”, 3, Voices of the Night (1839)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Christmas Bells,” st. 1 (1864)

Dave — Fri, 23 Dec 2016 21:16:19 +0000

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Christmas Bells,” st. 1 (1864)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Elegiac Verse,” In the Harbor (1882)

Dave — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:45:11 +0000

If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Elegiac Verse,” In the Harbor (1882)

See Emerson.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Holidays” (1876)

Dave — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:18:56 +0000

The holiest of holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart,
When the full river of feeling overflows.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Holidays” (1876)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Morituri Salutamus,” st. 21 (1875)

Dave — Wed, 03 May 2017 03:23:21 +0000

The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Morituri Salutamus,” st. 21 (1875)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Nuremberg,” st. 13

Dave — Tue, 27 May 2014 12:58:05 +0000

Dead he is not, but departed — for the artist never dies.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Nuremberg,” st. 13

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Resignation,” st. 5 (1849), The Seaside and the Fireside (1850)

Dave — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 15:55:42 +0000

There is no Death! What seems so is transition;
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life Elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Resignation,” st. 5 (1849), The Seaside and the Fireside (1850)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table Talk,” Drift-Wood (1857)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man’s life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table Talk,” Drift-Wood (1857)
(Source)

More discussion of this quotation here: If We Could Read the Secret History of Our Enemies, We Should Find in Each Man’s Life Sorrow and Suffering Enough To Disarm All Hostility – Quote Investigator.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table Talk,” Drift-Wood (1857)

Dave — Wed, 15 Apr 2015 12:10:40 +0000

Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table Talk,” Drift-Wood (1857)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk,” Drift-wood (1857)

Dave — Tue, 22 Nov 2016 06:15:46 +0000

A torn jacket is soon mended; but hard words bruise the heart of a child.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk,” Drift-wood (1857)
(Source)

See Howell (1659).

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk,” Driftwood (1857)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

The Laws of Nature are just, but terrible. There is no weak mercy in them. Cause and consequence are inseparable and inevitable. The elements have no forbearance. The fire burns, the water drowns, the air consumes, the earth buries. And perhaps it would be well for our race if the punishment of crimes against the Laws of Man were as inevitable as the punishment of crimes against the Laws of Nature — were Man as unerring in his judgments as Nature.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk,” Driftwood (1857)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk,” Driftwood (1857)

Dave — Fri, 02 Dec 2022 19:27:37 +0000

As turning the logs will make a dull fire burn, so change of studies a dull brain.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk,” Driftwood (1857)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Sun, 09 Jun 2019 23:40:59 +0000

Every man is in some sort a failure to himself. No one ever reaches the heights to which he aspires.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 16 Apr 2021 16:18:31 +0000

Truths that startled the generation in which they were first announced become in the next age the commonplaces of conversation; as the famous airs of operas which thrilled the first audiences come to be played on hand-organs in the streets.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 23 Apr 2021 18:20:04 +0000

Perseverance is a great element of success. If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 30 Apr 2021 14:53:58 +0000

There are but few thinkers in the world but a great many people who think they think.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 07 May 2021 16:39:51 +0000

A great part of the happiness of life consists not in fighting battles but in avoiding them. A masterly retreat is in itself a victory.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-talk”

Dave — Fri, 14 May 2021 15:26:00 +0000

The spring came suddenly, bursting upon the world as a child bursts into a room, with a laugh and a shout and hands full of flowers.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-talk”

Dave — Fri, 21 May 2021 20:25:14 +0000

The years come when the mind, like an old mill, ceases to grind; when weeds grow on the wall; and through every crack and leak in dam and sluice, spouts the useless water.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-talk”

Dave — Fri, 28 May 2021 14:46:06 +0000

The highest exercise of imagination is not to devise what has no existence, but rather to perceive what really exists, though unseen by the outward eye, — not creation, but insight.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-talk”

Dave — Fri, 04 Jun 2021 15:41:21 +0000

The happy should not insist too much upon their happiness in the presence of the unhappy.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 25 Jun 2021 14:18:47 +0000

Every man is in some sort a failure to himself. No one ever reaches the heights to which he aspires.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-talk”

Dave — Fri, 02 Jul 2021 15:21:53 +0000

Silence is a great peacemaker.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “Table-Talk”

Dave — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 15:02:45 +0000

The difference between a man of genius seen in his works and in person, is like that of a lighthouse seen by night and by day, — in the one case only a great fiery brain, in the other only a white tower.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table-Talk”
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “The Fire of Drift-Wood”, l. 13 in The Seaside and the Fireside (1850)

Dave — Fri, 18 Nov 2016 01:15:50 +0000

We spake of many a vanished scene,
Of what we once had thought and said,
Of what had been, and might have been,
And who was changed, and who was dead;
And all that fills the hearts of friends,
When first they feel, with secret pain,
Their lives thenceforth have separate ends,
And never can be one again.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“The Fire of Drift-Wood”, l. 13 in The Seaside and the Fireside (1850)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “The Poets,” Atlantic Monthly (Jul 1878)

Dave — Wed, 24 May 2017 00:04:27 +0000

Not in the clamor of the crowded street,
Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng,
But in ourselves, are triumph and defeat.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“The Poets,” Atlantic Monthly (Jul 1878)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “The Rainy Day,” st. 3 (1842)

Dave — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 21:44:39 +0000

Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“The Rainy Day,” st. 3 (1842)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “The Village Blacksmith,” st. 7 (1840)

Dave — Mon, 07 Apr 2025 18:56:48 +0000

Toiling — rejoicing — sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night’s repose.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“The Village Blacksmith,” st. 7 (1840)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “The Village Blacksmith”

Dave — Fri, 11 May 2012 10:27:46 +0000

Toiling, — rejoicing — sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night’s repose.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“The Village Blacksmith”

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- “There Was a Little Girl,” st. 1 (c. 1850)

Dave — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 20:07:48 +0000

There was a little girl,
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
When she was good,
She was very good indeed,
But when she was bad she was horrid.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“There Was a Little Girl,” st. 1 (c. 1850)
(Source)

Often printed with "She was very, very good" for the penultimate line, and sometimes with "And when she was bad" (e.g.).

His son, Ernest, says that Longfellow composed the rhyme while walking back and forth with his infant second daughter (Alice Mary, b. 1850). There is some dispute about this, as well as his authorship of the other stanzas of the poem.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- (Attributed)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Trust no future, however pleasant!
Let the dead past bury its dead!
Act, — act in the living Present!
Heart within and God overhead.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
(Attributed)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- (Attributed)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Nature is a revelation of God; Art a revelation of man.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
(Attributed)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- (Attributed)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

We see but dimly through the mists and vapors;
Amid these earthly damps
What seem to us but sad, funeral tapers
May be heaven’s distant lamps.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
(Attributed)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- A Covered Bridge at Lucerne

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

The grave is but a covered bridge leading from light to light, through a brief darkness.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
A Covered Bridge at Lucerne

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- A Psalm of Life

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
“Life is but an empty dream!”
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
A Psalm of Life

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Christus, pt. 2 “A Village Church” (1872)

Dave — Mon, 03 Aug 2015 13:09:55 +0000

No action, whether foul or fair,
Is ever done, but it leaves somewhere
A record, written by fingers ghostly,
As a blessing or a curse, and mostly
In the greater weakness or greater strength
Of the acts which follow it.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Christus, pt. 2 “A Village Church” (1872)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Hyperion: A Romance, 3.4 (1839)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Believe me, every heart has its secret sorrow which the world knows not, and oftentimes we call a man cold, when he is only sad.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Hyperion: A Romance, 3.4 (1839)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Hyperion, “The Story of Brother Bernardus” (1839)

Dave — Fri, 11 Mar 2022 16:35:57 +0000

In this world a man must either be an anvil or a hammer.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Hyperion, “The Story of Brother Bernardus” (1839)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Hyperion, 4.3 (1839)

Dave — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 03:05:28 +0000

The little I have seen of the world … teaches me to look upon the errors of others in sorrow, not in anger.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Hyperion, 4.3 (1839)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Hyperion, Book 2, ch. 3 (1839)

Dave — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 14:15:47 +0000

It is folly to pretend that one ever wholly recovers from a disappointed passion. Such wounds always leave a scar. There are faces I can never look upon without emotion. There are names I can never hear spoken without almost starting.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Hyperion, Book 2, ch. 3 (1839)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- John Endicott, Act 2, sc. 2 (1868)

Dave — Fri, 08 Jan 2016 18:06:02 +0000

There’s a brave fellow! There’s a man of pluck!
A man who’s not afraid to say his say,
Though a whole town’s against him.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
John Endicott, Act 2, sc. 2 (1868)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 1 (1849)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 1 (1849)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)

Dave — Wed, 07 Jun 2017 00:52:23 +0000

In character, in manners, in style, in all things, the supreme excellence is simplicity.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)

Dave — Fri, 16 Jul 2021 17:22:52 +0000

With many readers, brilliancy of style passes for affluence of thought; they mistake buttercups in the grass for immeasurable gold mines under the ground.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 30 (1849)

Dave — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 12:05:56 +0000

The secret demerits of which we alone, perhaps, are conscious, are often more difficult to bear than those which have been publicly censured in us, and thus in some degree atoned for.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Kavanagh: A Tale, ch. 30 (1849)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Kavanaugh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Men of genius are often dull and inert in society, as a blazing meteor, when it descends to earth, is only a stone.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Kavanaugh: A Tale, ch. 13 (1849)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Tales of a Wayside Inn, “The Poet’s Tale; The Birds of Killingworth” (1863)

Dave — Mon, 03 Nov 2014 14:12:01 +0000

For after all, the best thing one can do
When it is raining, is to let it rain.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Tales of a Wayside Inn, “The Poet’s Tale; The Birds of Killingworth” (1863)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- Tales of a Wayside Inn, Part 3 “The Theologian’s Tale: Elizabeth” part 4 (1874)

Dave — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 17:40:01 +0000

Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing;
Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness;
So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another,
Only a look and a voice; then darkness again and a silence.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Tales of a Wayside Inn, Part 3 “The Theologian’s Tale: Elizabeth” part 4 (1874)
(Source)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth -- The Song of Hiawatha (1855)

Dave — Mon, 27 Jul 2015 13:23:43 +0000

Deeds are better things than words are,
Actions mightier than boastings.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
The Song of Hiawatha (1855)