Robinson Jeffers - Man Quotes

11 Sourced Quotes

View all Robinson Jeffers Quotes
As for me, I would rather Be a worm in a wild apple than a son of man.

Robinson Jeffers
The gang serves lies, the passionate
Man plays his part; the cold passion for truth
Hunts in no pack.

Robinson Jeffers
I'd sooner, except the penalties, kill a man than a hawk.

Robinson Jeffers
The world's in a bad way, my man,
And bound to be worse before it mends;
Better lie up in the mountain here
Four or five centuries,
While the stars go over the lonely ocean...

Robinson Jeffers
Know that however ugly the parts appear
the whole remains beautiful. A severed hand
Is an ugly thing and man dissevered from the earth and stars
and his history... for contemplation or in fact...
Often appears atrociously ugly. Integrity is wholeness,
the greatest beauty is
Organic wholeness, the wholeness of life and things, the divine beauty
of the universe. Love that, not man
Apart from that, or else you will share man's pitiful confusions,
or drown in despair when his days darken.

Robinson Jeffers
I will have shepherds for my philosophers,
Tall dreary men lying on the hills all night
Watching the stars, let their dogs watch the sheep. And I'll have lunatics
For my poets, strolling from farm to farm, wild liars distorting
The country news into supernaturalism —
For all men to such minds are devils or gods — and that increases
Man's dignity, man's importance, necessary lies
Best told by fools.

Robinson Jeffers
And boys, be in nothing so moderate as in love of man, a clever servant,
insufferable master.
There is the trap that catches noblest spirits, that caught — they say —
God, when he walked on earth.

Robinson Jeffers
Science is not to serve but to know. Science is for itself its own value, it is not for man.

Robinson Jeffers
I strain the mind to imagine distances That are not in man's mind...

Robinson Jeffers
There is nothing like astronomy to pull the stuff out of man, His stupid dreams and red-rooster importance: let him count the star-swirls.

Robinson Jeffers
For man will be blotted out, the blithe earth die, the brave sun Die blind and blacken to the heart...

Robinson Jeffers