|
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
(1807 - 1882)
American poet and educator.
|
Science Quotes by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (31 quotes)
A Lady with a Lamp shall stand
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
'Santa Filomena' (1857), The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1867), 333.
A torn jacket, is soon mended; but hard words bruise the heart of a child.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1883), 1354.
And the squirrel, Adjidaumo,…
Take the thanks of Hiawatha,
And the name which now he gives you;
For hereafter and forever
Boys shall call you Adjidaumo,
Tail-in-air the boys shall call you!
Take the thanks of Hiawatha,
And the name which now he gives you;
For hereafter and forever
Boys shall call you Adjidaumo,
Tail-in-air the boys shall call you!
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From 'Hiawatha’s Fishing', in The Song of Hiawatha (1855), 105-106.
As great Pythagoras of yore,
Standing beside the blacksmith’s door,
And hearing the hammers, as they smote
The anvils with a different note,
Stole from the varying tones, that hung
Vibrant on every iron tongue,
The secret of the sounding wire.
And formed the seven-chorded lyre.
Standing beside the blacksmith’s door,
And hearing the hammers, as they smote
The anvils with a different note,
Stole from the varying tones, that hung
Vibrant on every iron tongue,
The secret of the sounding wire.
And formed the seven-chorded lyre.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From poem 'To A Child' (1847), as collected in The Poetical Works of H.W. Longfellow (1855), 132.
As turning the logs, will make a dull fire burn, so change of studies a dull brain.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1354.
Authors have a greater right than any copyright, though it is generally unacknowledged or disregarded. They have a right to the reader’s civility. There are favorable hours for reading a book, as for writing it, and to these the author has a claim. Yet many people think that when they buy a book they buy with it the right to abuse the author.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1355.
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night’s repose.
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night’s repose.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In poem, 'The Village Blacksmith', The Poetical Works of H.W. Longfellow (1855), 109.
Every dew-drop and rain-drop had a whole heaven within it.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Hyperion', The Prose Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1851), 137.
Great men stand like solitary towers in the city of God, and secret passages running deep beneath external nature give their thoughts intercourse with higher intelligences, which strengthens and consoles them, and of which the labourers on the surface do not even dream!
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Opening paragraph of his prose work, Kavanagh: A Tale (1849), 3.
Hope has as many lives as a cat or a king.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From Book III, 'A Talk on the Stairs', Hyperion: A Romance (1853), 213.
If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it; Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of earth.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
'Elegiac Verse' XI, In the Harbor: Ultima Thule—Part II (1882), 57.
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.
Some days must be dark and dreary.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From 'The Rainy Day', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1855), 112.
Joy and Temperance and Repose
Slam the door on the doctor’s nose.
Slam the door on the doctor’s nose.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Translated by Longfellow as a poetic aphorism from the Sinngedichte of Frifjjrich von Logau (17th century), Poems (1856), 253.
Know how sublime a thing it is
To suffer and be strong.
To suffer and be strong.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Concluding lines of 'The Light of Stars', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1855), 44.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Concluding stanza in 'A Psalm of Life', Poems (1856), 69.
Lives of great men remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
We can make our lives sublime,
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From poem, 'A Psalm of Life', collected in Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1855), 42.
Men of genius are often dull and inert in society; as the blazing meteor, when it descends to earth, is only a stone.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From Kavanagh: A Tale (1849), 49.
Most people would succeed in small things, if they were not troubled with great ambitions.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1354.
Round about what is, lies a whole mysterious world of might be, — a psychological romance of possibilities and things that do not happen. By going out a few minutes sooner or later, by stopping to speak with a friend at a corner, by meeting this man or that, or by turning down this street instead of the other, we may let slip some great occasion good, or avoid some impending evil, by which the whole current of our lives would have been changed. There is no possible solution to the dark enigma but the one word, “Providence.”
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1354.
Silently, one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven,
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels.
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From poem, 'Evangeline' collected in The Poetical Works of H.W. Longfellow (1855), 14.
Some critics are like chimney-sweepers; they put out the fire below, or frighten the swallows from their nests above: they scrape a long time in the chimney, cover themselves with soot, and bring nothing away but a bag of cinders, and then sing from the top of the house as if they had built it.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1355.
The first pressure of sorrow crushes out from our hearts the best wine; afterwards the constant weight of it brings forth bitterness, — the taste and stain from the lees of the vat.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1355.
The first watch of night is given
To the red planet Mars.
Is it the tender star of love?
The star of love and dreams?
Oh. no! from that blue tent above,
A hero’s armour gleams.
And earnest thoughts within me rise,
When I behold afar,
Suspended in the evening skies,
The shield of that red star.
O star of strength! I see thee stand
And smile upon my pain;
Thou beckonest with thy mailèd hand,
And I am strong again.
To the red planet Mars.
Is it the tender star of love?
The star of love and dreams?
Oh. no! from that blue tent above,
A hero’s armour gleams.
And earnest thoughts within me rise,
When I behold afar,
Suspended in the evening skies,
The shield of that red star.
O star of strength! I see thee stand
And smile upon my pain;
Thou beckonest with thy mailèd hand,
And I am strong again.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From 'The Light of Stars', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1855), 43.
The great secret of happiness consists not in enjoying, but in renouncing. But it is hard, very hard.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From Book III, 'A Talk on the Stairs', Hyperion: A Romance (1853), 213.
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 have no forbearance. The fire burns, the water drowns, the air consumes, the earth buries.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1354.
The swallow is come!
The swallow is come!
O, fair are the seasons, and light
Are the days that she brings,
With her dusky wings,
And her bosom snowy white!
The swallow is come!
O, fair are the seasons, and light
Are the days that she brings,
With her dusky wings,
And her bosom snowy white!
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In Hyperion: A Romance (1839), Vol. 1, Book 2, 97.
The tragic element in poetry is like Saturn in alchemy,—the Malevolent, the Destroyer of Nature; but without it no true Aurum Potabile, or Elixir of Life, can be made.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1355.
This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,
Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.
Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,
Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.
Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
From poem 'Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie' (1847), as collected in The Poetical Works of H.W. Longfellow (1855), 7.
We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In Kavanagh: A Tale (1849), 3.
When by night the frogs are croaking, kindle but a torch’s fire,
Ha! how soon they all are silent! Thus Truth silences the liar.
Ha! how soon they all are silent! Thus Truth silences the liar.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Translated by Longfellow as a poetic aphorism from the Sinngedichte of Frifjjrich von Logau (17th century), 'Truth' Poems (1856), 255.
When we reflect that all the aspects of Nature, all the emotions of the soul, and all the events of life, have been the subjects of poetry for hundreds and thousands of years, we can hardly wonder that there should be so many resemblances and coincidences of expression among poets, but rather that they are not more numerous and more striking.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In 'Table-Talk', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Volume 3 (1883), 1355.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
