Sir, I admit your general rule, That every poet is a fool, But you yourself may serve to show it, That every fool is not a poet.

Advice is like snow; the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind.

Our own heart, and not other men's opinions, forms our true honor.

Her lips were red, her looks were free, Her locks were yellow as gold: Her skin was white as leprosy, The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she, Who thicks man's blood with cold.

He prayeth best, who loveth best All things both great and small; For the dear God who loveth us, He made and loveth all.

He who is best prepared can best serve his moment of inspiration.

Since then, at an uncertain hour, That agony returns: And till my ghastly tale is told, This heart within me burns.

The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions - the little, soon forgotten charities of a kiss or a smile, a kind look or heartfelt compliment.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea.

A great mind must be androgynous.

Like one, that on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, And having once turned round walks on, And turns no more his head; Because he knows, a frightful fiend Doth close behind him tread.

Language is the armory of the human mind, and at once contains the trophies of its past and the weapons of its future conquests.

Nothing is as contagious as enthusiasm. It is the real allegory of the myth of Orpheus; it moves stones, and charms brutes. It is the genius of sincerity, and truth accomplishes no victories without it.

No man was ever yet a great poet, without at the same time being a profound philosopher.

A grief without a pang, void, dark and drear, A drowsy, stifled, unimpassioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet or relief, In word, or sigh, or tear.

Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone on a wide wide sea! And never a saint took pity on My soul in agony.

No mind is thoroughly well-organized that is deficient in a sense of humor.

I have seen gross intolerance shown in support of tolerance.

Works of imagination should be written in very plain language; the more purely imaginative they are the more necessary it is to be plain.

Deep thinking is attainable only by a man of deep feeling, and all truth is a species of revelation

The many men, so beautiful! And they all dead did lie: And a thousand thousand slimy things Lived on; and so did I.

What comes from the heart goes to the heart

The fair breeze blew, The white foam flew, And the forrow followed free. We were the first to ever burst into the silent sea.

Prose: words in their best order; poetry: the best words in the best order.

Good and bad men are each less so than they seem.

Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship, Yet she sailed softly too: Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze - On me alone it blew.

Alas; they had been friends in youth but whispering tongues can poison truth

He went like one that hath been stunn'd, And is of sense forlorn: A sadder and a wiser man He rose the morrow morn.

Swans sing before they die— 't were no bad thing Should certain persons die before they sing.

A man’s desire is for the woman, but the woman’s desire is rarely other than for the desire of the man.

If a man could pass through Paradise in a dream, and have a flower presented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and if he found that flower in his hand when he awoke - Aye! and what then?

Sympathy constitutes friendship; but in love there is a sort of antipathy, or opposing passion. Each strives to be the other, and both together make up one whole.

To see him act is like reading Shakespeare by flashes of lightning.

An orphans curse would drag to hell A spirit from on high; But oh! How more horrible that that Is the curse in a dead man’s eye!

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly

Everyone should have two or three hives of bees. Bees are easier to keep than a dog or a cat. They are more interesting than gerbils.

Ah! well a-day! what evil looks Had I from old and young! Instead of the cross, the Albatross About my neck was hung.

If you would stand well with a great mind, leave him with a favorable impression of yourself; if with a little mind, leave him with a favorable impression of himself.

And to be wroth with one we love…Doth work like madness in the brain.

He prayeth best who loveth best, all things both great and small.

Willing Suspension of Disbelief

I look'd to Heav'n, and try'd to pray; But or ever a prayer had gusht, A wicked whisper came and made My heart as dry as dust.

Until you understand a writer's ignorance, presume yourself ignorant of his understanding.

They stood aloof the scars remaining. Like cliffs which had been rent asunder.

In nature there is nothing melancholy

Nature has her proper interest; and he will know what it is, who believes and feels, that every thing has a life of its own, and that we are all one life.

To be loved is all I need, And whom I love, I love indeed.

Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white, Glimmered the white moonshine. [...] Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean.

What is an Epigram? A dwarfish whole, Its body brevity, and wit its soul.

An orphan's curse would drag to hell A spirit from on high; But oh! more horrible than that Is the curse in a dead man's eye! Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse, And yet I could not die.