36 BEST THOUGHTS OF BEST THINKERS. The common people do not accurately adapt their thoughts to ob jects; nor, secondly, do they accurately adapt their words to their thoughts;31 they do not mean to lie; but, taking no pains to be exact, they give you very false accounts. proverbial; if anything rocks at all, they say it rocks like a cradle, and so they go on.209-Johnson. A great part of their language is The Creator has gifted the whole universe with language, but few are the hearts that can interpret it. foreign tongue, acquired imperfectly with care and pain, but rather a native language, learned unconsciously from the lips of the great Happy, those to whom it is no mother.-Bulwer. 153 As a hawk flieth not high with one wing, even so a man reacheth not to excellence with one tongue.-Roger Ascham. To acquire a few tongues is the task of a few years; quent in one is the labor of a life.-Spurgeon. to be elo A countryman is as warm in fustian as a king in velvet, and the The language denotes the man; Thinking cannot be clear till it has had expression.-We must write Language is a solemn thing. out of its Every language is a agonies and ecstacies, its wants and its weariness. -O. W. Holmes. There is no tracing of ancient nations but by language; therefore I am always sorry when any language is lost, for languages are the pedigree of nations.-Johnson. There was speech in their dumbness; language in their very gesture.-Shakespeare. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.—Johnson. Language was given us that we might say pleasant things to each other.-Bovee. Languages, like our bodies, are in a perpetual flux, and stand in need of recruits to supply these words which are continually falling into disuse.-Felton. Words are161 the leaves of the tree of language of which, if some fall away, a new succession takes their place.-French. BEST THOUGHTS ABOUT POETRY. You will find poetry nowhere, unless you bring some with you. Poetry is music in words; and music is poetry in sound; both excellent sauce, but those have lived and died poor who made them their meat.-Fuller. The office of poetry is not to make us think accurately, but to feel truly.-F. W. Robertson. Poetry is the music of thought conveyed to us in the music of language.-Chatfield. Words become luminous when the poet's finger has passed over them its phosphorescence.-Joubert. A poet must needs be before his own age, to be even with posterity. Poetry is not made out of the understanding. The question of common sense is always, "What is it good for?" a question which would abolish the rose and be triumphantly answered by the cabbage. -J. R. Lowell. The poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling, doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven; and, as imagination bodies forth the forms of things unknown, the poet's pen turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing a local habitation and a name.-Shakespeare. Of all kinds of ambition, that which pursues poetical fame is the wildest.-Goldsmith. Poetry is the sister of sorrow; every man that suffers and weeps, is a poet; every tear is a verse; and every heart a poem.-Andre. Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward; it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.-Coleridge. Poetry and consumption are the most flattering of diseases. Thoughts that breathe and words that burn.-Gray. Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feeling, revives the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the spring-time of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and, through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life. Channing. A poet ought not to pick nature's pocket. Let him borrow, and so borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing, examine nature accurately, but write from recollection, and trust more to the imagination than the memory.-Coleridge. Poets are never young in one sense. Their delicate ear hears the far-off whispers of eternity, which coarser souls must travel towards for scores of years before their dull sense is touched by them.-Holmes. The common people do not accurately adapt their thoughts to objects; nor, secondly, do they accurately adapt their words to their thoughts;31 they do not mean to lie; but, taking no pains to be exact, they give you very false accounts. A great part of their language is proverbial; if anything rocks at all, they say it rocks like a cradle, and so they go on.209-Johnson. The Creator has gifted the whole universe with language, but few are the hearts that can interpret it. Happy, those to whom it is no foreign tongue, acquired imperfectly with care and pain, but rather a native language, learned unconsciously from the lips of the great mother.-Bulwer. 153 As a hawk flieth not high with one wing, even so a man reacheth not to excellence with one tongue.-Roger Ascham. To acquire a few tongues is the task of a few years; to be eloquent in one is the labor of a life.-Spurgeon. A countryman is as warm in fustian as a king in velvet, and the truth is as comfortable in homely language as in fine speech. As to the way of dishing up the meat, hungry men leave that to the cook, only let the meat be sweet and substantial.—Spurgeon. The language denotes the man; a coarse or refined character finds its expression naturally in a coarse or refined phraseology.-Bovee. Felicity, not fluency of language, is a merit.-E. P. Whipple. Thinking cannot be clear till it has had expression. We must write or speak, or act our thoughts, or they will remain in a half-torpid form. Our feelings must have expression or they will be as clouds, which, till they descend in rain, will never bring up fruit or flower.So it is with all the inward feelings; expression gives them development. Thought is the blossom; language the opening bud; action the fruit behind it.-Beecher. Language is a solemn thing. It grows out of life out of its agonies and ecstacies, its wants and its weariness. - Every language is a temple in which the soul of those who speak is enshrined. -O. W. Holmes. There is no tracing of ancient nations but by language; therefore I am always sorry when any language is lost, for languages are the pedigree of nations.-Johnson. There was speech in their dumbness; language in their very gesture. Shakespeare. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.-Johnson. Language was given us that we might say pleasant things to each other.-Bovee. Languages, like our bodies, are in a perpetual flux, and stand in need of recruits to supply these words which are continually falling into disuse.-Felton. Words are161 the leaves of the tree of language of which, if some fall away, a new succession takes their place.-French. BEST THOUGHTS ABOUT POETRY. You will find poetry nowhere, unless you bring some with you. Poetry is music in words; and music is poetry in sound; both excellent sauce, but those have lived and died poor who made them their meat.-Fuller. The office of poetry is not to make us think accurately, but to feel truly.-F. W. Robertson. Poetry is the music of thought conveyed to us in the music of language.-Chatfield. Words become luminous when the poet's finger has passed over them its phosphorescence.-Joubert. A poet must needs be before his own age, to be even with posterity. Poetry is not made out of the understanding. The question of common sense is always, "What is it good for?" a question which would abolish the rose and be triumphantly answered by the cabbage. -J. R. Lowell. The poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling, doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven; and, as imagination bodies forth the forms of things unknown, the poet's pen turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing a local habitation and a name.-Shakespeare. Of all kinds of ambition, that which pursues poetical fame is the wildest.-Goldsmith. Poetry is the sister of sorrow; every man that suffers and weeps, is a poet; every tear is a verse; and every heart a poem.-Andre. Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward; it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.-Coleridge. Poetry and consumption are the most flattering of diseases. Thoughts that breathe and words that burn.-Gray. Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feeling, revives the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the spring-time of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and, through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life.-Channing. A poet ought not to pick nature's pocket. Let him borrow, and so borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing, examine nature accurately, but write from recollection, and trust more to the imagination than the memory.-Coleridge. Poets are never young in one sense. Their delicate ear hears the far-off whispers of eternity, which coarser souls must travel towards for scores of years before their dull sense is touched by them.-Holmes. The common people do not accurately adapt their thoughts to objects; nor, secondly, do they accurately adapt their words to their thoughts;31 they do not mean to lie; but, taking no pains to be exact, they give you very false accounts. A great part of their language is proverbial; if anything rocks at all, they say it rocks like a cradle, and so they go on.209-Johnson. The Creator has gifted the whole universe with language, but few are the hearts that can interpret it. Happy, those to whom it is no foreign tongue, acquired imperfectly with care and pain, but rather a native language, learned unconsciously from the lips of the great mother.-Bulwer. 153 As a hawk flieth not high with one wing, even so a man reacheth not to excellence with one tongue.-Roger Ascham. To acquire a few tongues is the task of a few years; to be eloquent in one is the labor of a life.—Spurgeon. A countryman is as warm in fustian as a king in velvet, and the truth is as comfortable in homely language as in fine speech. As to the way of dishing up the meat, hungry men leave that to the cook, only let the meat be sweet and substantial.-Spurgeon. The language denotes the man; a coarse or refined character finds its expression naturally in a coarse or refined phraseology.—Bovee. Felicity, not fluency of language, is a merit.-E. P. Whipple. Thinking cannot be clear till it has had expression.-We must write or speak, or act our thoughts, or they will remain in a half-torpid form. Our feelings must have expression or they will be as clouds, which, till they descend in rain, will never bring up fruit or flower.So it is with all the inward feelings; expression gives them development. Thought is the blossom; language the opening bud; action the fruit behind it.-Beecher. Language is a solemn thing. It grows out of life agonies and ecstacies, its wants and its weariness. temple in which the soul of those who speak is enshrined. out of its Every language is a -O. W. Holmes. There is no tracing of ancient nations but by language; therefore I am always sorry when any language is lost, for languages are the pedigree of nations.-Johnson. There was speech in their dumbness; language in their very gesture. Shakespeare. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas.-Johnson. Language was given us that we might say pleasant things to each other.-Bovee. Languages, like our bodies, are in a perpetual flux, and stand in need of recruits to supply these words which are continually falling into disuse.-Felton. Words are161 the leaves of the tree of language of which, if some fall away, a new succession takes their place.-French. |