William Wordsworth Quotes

411 Sourced Quotes

That to this mountain-daisy's self were known The beauty of its star-shaped shadow, thrown On the smooth surface of this naked stone!

William Wordsworth
But who shall parcel out His intellect by geometric rules, Split like a province into round and square?

William Wordsworth
Oh, blank confusion! true epitome Of what the mighty City is herself, To thousands upon thousands of her sons, Living amid the same perpetual whirl Of trivial objects, melted and reduced To one identity.

William Wordsworth
Prompt to move but firm to wait - knowing things rashly sought are rarely found.

William Wordsworth
Stay, little cheerful Robin! stay, And at my casement sing, Though it should prove a farewell lay And this our parting spring. * * * * * Then, little Bird, this boon confer, Come, and my requiem sing, Nor fail to be the harbinger Of everlasting spring.

William Wordsworth
Long as there's a sun that sets, Primroses will have their glory; Long as there are violets, They will have a place in story: There's a flower that shall be mine, 'Tis the little Celandine.

William Wordsworth
Eyes of some men travel far For the finding of a star; Up and down the heavens they go. Like a sage astronomer.

William Wordsworth
When men change swords for ledgers, and desert
The student's bower for gold, some fears unnamed
I had, my Country--am I to be blamed?

William Wordsworth
Knowledge and increase of enduring joy
From the great Nature that exists in works
Of mighty Poets.

William Wordsworth
Look for the stars, you'll say that there are none; / Look up a second time, and, one by one, / You mark them twinkling out with silvery light, / And wonder how they could elude the sight!

William Wordsworth
Nor will I then thy modest grace forget, Chaste Snow-drop, venturous harbinger of Spring, And pensive monitor of fleeting years!

William Wordsworth
In heaven above, And earth below, they best can serve true gladness Who meet most feelingly the calls of sadness.

William Wordsworth
The streams with softest sound are flowing, The grass you almost hear it growing, You hear it now, if e'er you can.

William Wordsworth
I've watched you now a full half-hour; Self-poised upon that yellow flower And, little Butterfly! Indeed I know not if you sleep or feed. How motionless! - not frozen seas More motionless! and then What joy awaits you, when the breeze Hath found you out among the trees, And calls you forth again!

William Wordsworth
Private courts, Gloomy as coffins, and unsightly lanes Thrilled by some female vendor's scream, belike The very shrillest of all London cries, May then entangle our impatient steps; Conducted through those labyrinths, unawares, To privileged regions and inviolate, Where from their airy lodges studious lawyers Look out on waters, walks, and gardens green.

William Wordsworth
Spirits that crowd the intellectual sphere With mazy boundaries, as the astronomer With orb and cycle girds the starry throng.

William Wordsworth
Among the dwellings framed by birds In fields or forests with nice care, Is none that with the little wren's In snugness may compare.

William Wordsworth
Ah, what a warning for a thoughtless man, Could field or grove, could any spot of earth, Show to his eye an image of the pangs Which it hath witnessed,-render back an echo Of the sad steps by which it hath been trod!

William Wordsworth
Either still I find Some imperfection in the chosen theme, Or see of absolute accomplishment Much wanting, so much wanting, in myself, That I recoil and droop, and seek repose In listlessness from vain perplexity, Unprofitably travelling towards the grave.

William Wordsworth
The knowledge both of the Poet and the Man of science is pleasure; but the knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary part of our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come to us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us with our fellow-beings.

William Wordsworth
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, wherever nature led.

William Wordsworth
WHAT crowd is this? what have we here! we must not pass it by; A Telescope upon its frame, and pointed to the sky: Long is it as a barber's pole, or mast of little boat, Some little pleasure-skiff, that doth on Thames's waters float.

William Wordsworth
I should dread to disfigure the beautiful ideal of the memories of illustrious persons with incongruous features, and to sully the imaginative purity of classical works with gross and trivial recollections.

William Wordsworth
The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude.

William Wordsworth
There is a Thorn - it looks so old, In truth, you'd find it hard to say How it could ever have been young, It looks so old and gray.

William Wordsworth
But to a higher mark than song can reach,
Rose this pure eloquence.

William Wordsworth
Here must thou be, O man, Strength to thyself - no helper hast thou here - Here keepest thou thy individual state: No other can divide with thee this work, No secondary hand can intervene To fashion this ability. 'Tis thine, The prime and vital principle is thine In the recesses of thy nature, far From any reach of outward fellowship, Else 'tis not thine at all.

William Wordsworth
I have seen A curious child, who dwelt upon a tract Of inland ground, applying to his ear The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell; To which, in silence hushed, his very soul Listened intensely; and his countenance soon Brightened with joy; for from within were heard Murmurings, whereby the monitor expressed Mysterious union with its native sea.

William Wordsworth
A lawyer art thou? Draw not nigh! Go, carry to some fitter place The keenness of that practised eye, The hardness of that sallow face.

William Wordsworth
If the time should ever come when what is now called Science, thus famliarised to men, shall be ready to put on, as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his divine spirit to the aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man.

William Wordsworth