WIST Quotations

Barrie, James -- Peter and Wendy, ch. 17 “When Wendy Grew Up” (1911)

Dave — Tue, 24 Jun 2025 18:31:20 +0000

As you look at Wendy, you may see her hair becoming white, and her figure little again, for all this happened long ago. Jane is now a common grown-up, with a daughter called Margaret; and every spring cleaning time, except when he forgets, Peter comes for Margaret and takes her to the Neverland, where she tells him stories about himself, to which he listens eagerly. When Margaret grows up she will have a daughter, who is to be Peter’s mother in turn; and thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless.

J. M. Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist [James Matthew Barrie]
Peter and Wendy, ch. 17 “When Wendy Grew Up” (1911)
(Source)

Final lines of the novel.

Barrie's novelization of the play Peter Pan (1904, but first published 1928) incorporated a coda to the story from his 1908 sequel, When Wendy Grew Up, An Afterthought, which had this line, Wendy speaking to Nana:

WENDY: This is how I planned it if he ever came back. Every Spring Cleaning, except when he forgets, I'll let Jane fly away with him to the darling Never Never Land, and when she grows up I hope she will have a little daughter, who will fly away with him in turn – and in this way may I go on for ever and ever, dear Nana, so long as children are young and innocent.

Byron, George Gordon, Lord -- Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 4, st. 108 (1818)

Dave — Mon, 05 May 2025 22:57:43 +0000

There is the moral of all human tales;
‘Tis but the same rehearsal of the past,
First Freedom, and then Glory — when that fails,
Wealth — Vice — Corruption, — Barbarism at last.

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 4, st. 108 (1818)
(Source)

Byron, George Gordon, Lord -- Conversations of Lord Byron with Thomas Medwin, Vol. 2 (1832)

Dave — Thu, 23 Mar 2023 14:23:34 +0000

Who knows whether, when a comet shall approach this globe to destroy it, as it often has been and will be destroyed, men will not tear rocks from their foundations by means of steam, and hurl mountains, as the giants are said to have done, against the flaming mass? — and then we shall have traditions of Titans again, and of wars with Heaven.

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) English poet
Conversations of Lord Byron with Thomas Medwin, Vol. 2 (1832)
(Source)

Keats, John -- “Faery Songs,” I (1818)

Dave — Tue, 31 Dec 2013 17:23:32 +0000

Shed no tear! O shed no tear!
The flower will bloom another year.
Weep no more! O weep no more!
Young buds sleep in the root’s white core.

John Keats (1795-1821) English poet
“Faery Songs,” I (1818)

King, Martin Luther -- Strength To Love, ch. 5 “Loving Your Enemies,” sec. 2 (1963)

Dave — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 14:26:24 +0000

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction […] The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) American clergyman, civil rights leader, social activist, preacher
Strength To Love, ch. 5 “Loving Your Enemies,” sec. 2 (1963)
(Source)

See also this.

Eldridge, Paul -- Maxims for a Modern Man, #642 (1965)

Dave — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 11:39:16 +0000

Democracy stands between two tyrannies: the one which it has overthrown and the one into which it will develop.

Paul Eldridge (1888-1982) American educator, novelist, poet
Maxims for a Modern Man, #642 (1965)
(Source)

Millay, Edna St. Vincent -- Letter (1930-10-24) to Arthur Davison Ficke

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

It’s not true that life is one damn thing after another — it’s one damn thing over & over — there’s the rub — first you get sick — then you get sicker — then you get not quite so sick — then you get hardly sick at all — then you get a little sicker — then you get a lot sicker — then you get not quite so sick — oh, hell.

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) American poet
Letter (1930-10-24) to Arthur Davison Ficke
(Source)

See Hubbard, Scalzi.

More information about this quotation: It’s Not True That Life Is One Damn Thing After Another—It’s One Damn Thing Over and Over – Quote Investigator®.