Quotes by William Wordsworth

“The mind that is wise mourns less for what age takes away than what it leaves behind.”

“But an old age serene and bright, and lovely as a Lapland night, shall lead thee to thy grave.”

“Pictures deface walls more often than they decorate them.”

“The human mind is capable of excitement without the application of gross and violent stimulants and he must have a very faint perception of its beauty and dignity who does not know this.”

“That best portion of a man's life, his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love.”

“The best portion of a good man's life is his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.”

“In modern business it is not the crook who is to be feared most, it is the honest man who doesn't know what he is doing.”

“When from our better selves we have too long been parted by the hurrying world, and droop. Sick of its business, of its pleasures tired, how gracious, how benign is solitude.”

“The child is father of the man.”

“Faith is a passionate intuition.”

“How does the Meadow flower its bloom unfold? Because the lovely little flower is free down to its root, and in that freedom bold.”

“Life is divided into three terms - that which was, which is, and which will be. Let us learn from the past to profit by the present, and from the present, to live better in the future.”

“Not without hope we suffer and we mourn.”

“With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the life of things.”

“For I have learned to look on nature, not as in the hour of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes the still, sad music of humanity.”

“I listened, motionless and still And, as I mounted up the hill, The music in my heart I bore, Long after it was heard no more.”

“Come forth into the light of things, let nature be your teacher.”

“Nature never did betray the heart that loved her.”

“Suffering is permanent, obscure and dark, And shares the nature of infinity.”

“The world is too much with us late and soon, getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours.”

“Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility.”

“Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers.”

“Golf is a day spent in a round of strenuous idleness.”

“That though the radiance which was once so bright be now forever taken from my sight. Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, glory in the flower. We will grieve not, rather find strength in what remains behind.”

“Wisdom is oftentimes nearer when we stoop than when we soar.”

Click here to go back to main page.

Learn more about William Wordsworth.