Byron, George Gordon, Lord -- “Prometheus,” st. 1 (1816)

Dave — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 22:43:14 +0000

Titan! to whom immortal eyes
The sufferings of mortality
Seen in their sad reality,
Were not as things that gods despise;
What was thy pity’s recompense?
A silent suffering, and intense;
The rock, the vulture, and the chain,
All that the proud can feel of pain,
The agony they do not show,
The suffocating sense of woe,
Which speaks but in its loneliness,
And then is jealous lest the sky
Should have a listener, nor will sigh
Until its voice is echoless.

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
“Prometheus,” st. 1 (1816)
(Source)

Stevenson, Robert Louis -- Essay (1877-07), “An Apology for Idlers,” Cornhill Magazine, Vol. 36

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

There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy. By being happy, we sow anonymous benefits upon the world, which remain unknown even to ourselves, or when they are disclosed, surprise nobody so much as the benefactor.

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
Essay (1877-07), “An Apology for Idlers,” Cornhill Magazine, Vol. 36
(Source)

Collected in Virginibus Puerisque and Other Papers, ch. 3 (1881)

WIST Quotations

Byron, George Gordon, Lord -- “Prometheus,” st. 1 (1816)

Stevenson, Robert Louis -- Essay (1877-07), “An Apology for Idlers,” Cornhill Magazine, Vol. 36