Top quotes by Algernon Charles Swinburne

From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be That no life lives for ever; That dead men rise up never; That even the weariest river Winds somewhere safe to sea. Votes: 23

White rose in red rose-garden Is not so white; Snowdrops, that plead for pardon And pine for fright Because the hard East blows Over their maiden vows, Grow not as this face grows from pale to bright. Votes: 17

The tadpole poet will never grow into anything bigger than a frog; not though in that stage of development he should puff and blow himself till he bursts with windy adulation at the heels of the laureled ox. Votes: 15

Love lies bleeding in the bed whereover Roses lean with smiling mouths or pleading: Earth lies laughing where the sun's dart clove her: Love lies bleeding. Votes: 11

In fierce March weather White waves break tether, And whirled together At either hand, Like weeds uplifted, The tree-trunks rifted In spars are drifted, Like foam or sand. Votes: 11

God's own hand Holds fast all issues of our deeds: with him The end of all our ends is, but with us Our ends are, just or unjust: though our works Find righteous or unrighteous judgment, this At least is ours, to make them righteous. Votes: 8

To say of shame - what is it? Of virtue - we can miss it; Of sin-we can kiss it, And it's no longer sin. Votes: 7

Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; And marriage and death and division Make barren our lives. Votes: 7

While three men hold together, the kingdoms are less by three. Votes: 7

But now, you are twain, you are cloven apartFlesh of his flesh, but heart of my heart." Votes: 7

The tadpole poet will never grow into anything bigger than a frog. Votes: 7

His speech is a burning fire. Votes: 6

Today will die tomorrow. Votes: 6

Body and spirit are twins: God only knows which is which. Votes: 6

When the hounds of Spring are on winter's traces, The mother of months in meadow or plain Fills the shadows and windy places With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain. Votes: 5

The highest spiritual quality, the noblest property of mind a man can have, is this of loyalty ... a man with no loyalty in him, with no sense of love or reverence or devotion due to something outside and above his poor daily life, with its pains and pleasures, profits and losses, is as evil a case as man can be. Votes: 5

Fruits fail and love dies and time ranges;Thou art fed with perpetual breath, and alive after infinite changes,And fresh from the kisses of death,Of langours rekindled and rallied, Of barren delights and unclean,Things monstrous and fruitless, a pallidAnd poisonous queen. Votes: 4

A baby's feet, like sea-shells pink Might tempt, should heaven see meet, An angel's lips to kiss, we think, A baby's feet. Votes: 4

For words divide and rend But silence is most noble till the end. Votes: 4

I have lived long enough, having seen one thing, that love hath an end Votes: 4

A little soul scarce fledged for earth Takes wing with heaven again for goal, Even while we hailed as fresh from birth A little soul. Votes: 3

Love, as is told by the seers of old, Comes as a butterfly tipped with gold, Flutters and flies in sunlit skies, Weaving round hearts that were one time cold. Votes: 3

I am tired of tears and laughter, And men that laugh and weep Of what may come hereafter For men that sow to reap: I am weary of days and hours, Blown buds of barren flowers, Desires and dreams and powers And everything but sleep. Votes: 3

Blossom by blossom the spring begins. Votes: 3

Hope thou not much, and fear thou not at all. Votes: 2

Heart's ease of pansy, pleasure or thought, Which would the picture give us of these? Surely the heart that conceived it sought Heart's ease. Votes: 2

O brother, the gods were good to you.Sleep, and be glad while the worldendures.Be well content as the years wearthrough;Give thanks for life, and the loves andlures;Give thanks for life, O brother, anddeath,For the sweet last sound of her feet, herbreath,For gifts she gave you, gracious andfew,Tears and kisses, that lady of yours. Votes: 1

When I hear that a friend has fallen into matrimony, I feel the same sorrow as if I had heard of his lapsing into theism. Votes: 0

I remember the way we parted, The day and the way we met; You hoped we were both broken-hearted And knew we should both forget. Votes: 0

For winter's rains and ruins are over, And all the season of snows and sins; The days dividing lover and lover, The light that loses, the night that wins; And time remembered isgrief forgotten, And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, And in green underwood and cover Blossom by blossom the spring begins. Votes: 0

In friendship's fragrant garden, There are flowers of every hue. Each with its own fair beauty And its gift of joy for you. Friendship's Garden If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf, Our lives would grow together In sad or singing weather. Votes: 0

For the crown of our life as it closes Is darkness, the fruit thereof dust; No thorns go as deep as a rose's, And love is more cruel than lust. Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; And marriage and death and division Make barren our lives. Votes: 0

There is no God found stronger than death; and death is a sleep. Votes: 0

Before the beginning of years There came to the making of man Time with a gift of tears, Grief with a glass that ran, Pleasure with pain for leaven, Summer with flowers that fell, Remembrance fallen from heaven, And Madness risen from hell, Strength without hands to smite, Love that endures for a breath; Night, the shadow of light, And Life, the shadow of death. Votes: 0

If you were Queen of pleasure And I were King of pain We'd hunt down Love together, Pluck out his flying-feather, And teach his feet a measure, And find his mouth a rein; If you were Queen of pleasure And I were King of pain. Votes: 0

And the best and the worst of this is That neither is most to blame, If you have forgotten my kisses And I have forgotten your name. Votes: 0

The loves and hours of the life of a man, They are swift and sad, being born of the sea. Votes: 0

Love laid his sleepless head On a thorny rose bed: And his eyes with tears were red, And pale his lips as the dead. Votes: 0

Faith speaks when hope is disassembled; faith lives when hope dies dead. Votes: 0

I shall sleep, and move with the moving ships, Change as the winds change, veer in the tide. Votes: 0

Then star nor sun shall waken, Nor any change of light: Nor sound of waters shaken, Nor any sound or sight: Nor wintry leaves nor vernal; Nor days nor things diurnal; Only the sleep eternal In an eternal night. Votes: 0

I that have love and no more Give you but love of you, sweet; He that hath more, let him give; He that hath wings, let him soar; Mine is the heart at your feet Here, that must love you to live. Votes: 0

Where might is, the right is: Long purses make strong swords. Let weakness learn meekness: God save the House of Lords! Votes: 0

The sweetest flowers in all the world- A baby's hands. Votes: 0

Sorrow, on wing through the world for ever, Here and there for awhile would borrow Rest, if rest might haply deliver Sorrow... Votes: 0

Marvellous mercies and infinite love. Votes: 0

Love is more cruel than lust. Votes: 0

There is no such thing as a dumb poet or a handless painter. The essence of an artist is that he should be articulate. Votes: 0

Thou has conquered, O pale Galilean. Votes: 0

His life is a watch or a vision Between a sleep and a sleep. Votes: 0

To wipe off the froth of falsehood from the foaming lips of inebriated virtue, when fresh from the sexless orgies of morality and reeling from the delirious riot of religion, may doubtless be a charitable office. Votes: 0

Wherever there is a grain of loyalty there is a glimpse of freedom. Votes: 0

There grows No herb of help to heal a coward heart. Votes: 0

Doubt is faith in the main: but faith, on the whole, is doubt; We cannot believe by proof: but could we believe without? Votes: 0

As a god self-slain on his own strange altar, Death lies dead. Votes: 0

There lived a singer in France of old By the tideless dolorous midland sea. In a land of sand and rain and gold There shone one woman, and none but she. Votes: 0

On the mountains of memory by the world's wellsprings, in all man's eyes, where the light of life of him is on all past things, death only dies. Votes: 0

There is no safety-net to protect against attraction. Votes: 0

Despair the twin-born of devotion. Votes: 0

Life is the lust of a lamp for the light that is dark till the dawn of the day that we die. Votes: 0

For whom all winds are quiet as the sun,/ All waters as the shore. Votes: 0

Let weakness learn meekness. Votes: 0

For winter's rains and ruins are over... And in Green under wood and cover Blossum by blossom the spring begins. Votes: 0

In hawthorn-time the heart grows light. Votes: 0

The beast faith lives on its own dung. Votes: 0

Cold autumn, wan with wrath of wind and rain, Saw pass a soul sweet as the sovereign tune That death smote silent when he smote again. Votes: 0

When fate has allowed to any man more than one great gift, accident or necessity seems usually to contrive that one shall encumber and impede the other. Votes: 0

I will go back to the great sweet mother, Mother and lover of men, the sea. I will go down to her, I and no other, Close with her, kiss her and mix her with me. Votes: 0

The sun is all about the world we see, the breath and strength of every spring. Votes: 0

In the world of dreams, I have chosen my part. To sleep for a season and hear no word Of true love's truth or of light love's art, Only the song of a secret bird. Votes: 0

Fate is a sea without a shore, and the soul is a rock that abides. Votes: 0

She knows not loves that kissed her She knows not where. Art thou the ghost, my sister, White sister there, Am I the ghost, who knows? My hand, a fallen rose, Lies snow-white on white snows, and takes no care. Votes: 0

In the world of dreams, I have chosen my part. Votes: 0

Sleep; and if life was bitter to thee, pardon, If sweet, give thanks; thou hast no more to live; And to give thanks is good, and to forgive. Votes: 0

The highest spiritual quality, the noblest property of mind a man can have, is this of loyalty. Votes: 0

To have read the greatest works of any great poet, to have beheld or heard the greatest works of any great painter or musician, is a possession added to the best things of life. Votes: 0

Fear that makes faith may break faith. Votes: 0

Love, till dawn sunder night from day with fire Dividing my delight and my desire... Votes: 0

Yet leave me not; yet, if thou wilt, be free; love me no more, but love my love of thee. Votes: 0

Change lays not her hand upon truth. Votes: 0

O Love, O great god Love, what have I done, That thou shouldst hunger so after my death? My heart is harmless as my life's first day: Seek out some false fair woman, and plague her Till her tears even as my tears fill her bed. Votes: 0

Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean; the world has grown grey from thy breath;/ We have drunken of things Lethean, and fed on the fullness of death Votes: 0

Ask nothing more of me sweet; All I can give you I give; Heart of my heart were it more, More would be laid at your feet.. Votes: 0

I dore not always touch her, lest the kiss Leave my lips charred. Yea, Lord, a little bliss, Brief, bitter bliss, one hath for a great sin; Nathless thou knowest how sweet a thing it is. Votes: 0

But now, you are twain, you are cloven apart Flesh of his flesh, but heart of my heart. Votes: 0

Before the beginning of years There came to the making of man Time with a gift of tears, Grief with a glass that ran . Votes: 0

If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf, Our lives would grow together In sad or singing weather. Votes: 0

Our way is where God knows And Love knows where: We are in Love's hand to-day. Votes: 0

We, drinking love at the furthest springs, Covered with love as a covering tree, We had grown as gods, as the gods above, Filled from the heart to the lips with love, Held fast in his hands, clothed warm with his wings, O love, my love, had you loved but me! Votes: 0

Wan February with weeping cheer, Whose cold hand guides the youngling year Down misty roads of mire and rime, Before thy pale and fitful face The shrill wind shifts the clouds apace Through skies the morning scarce may climb. Thine eyes are thick with heavy tears, But lit with hopes that light the year's. Votes: 0

My loss may shine yet goodlier than your gain When Time and God give judgment. Votes: 0

Hope knows not if fear speaks truth, nor fear whether hope be blind as she. Votes: 0

At the door of life by the gate of breath, There are worse things waiting for men than death. Votes: 0

And lo, between the sundawn and the sun His day's work and his night's work are undone: And lo, between the nightfall and the light, He is not, and none knoweth of such an one. Votes: 0

Not with dreams, but with blood and with iron, Shall a nation be moulded at last. Votes: 0

Forget that I remember And dream that I forget. Votes: 0

Though one were fair as roses His beauty clouds and closes. Votes: 0

There was a poor poet named Clough, Whom his friends all united to puff, But the public, though dull, Had not such a skull As belonged to believers in Clough. Votes: 0

Stately, kindly, lordly friend Condescend Here to sit by me. Votes: 0

No blast of air or fire of sun Puts out the light whereby we run With girdled loins our lamplit race, And each from each takes heart of grace And spirit till his turn be done. Votes: 0

We are not sure of sorrow, And joy was never sure; Today will die tomorrow; Time stoops to no man's lure. Votes: 0

Change lays her hand not upon the truth. Votes: 0

Is not Precedent indeed a King of men? A Word from the Psalmist. Votes: 0

Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives. Votes: 0

The more congenial page of some tenth-rate poeticule worn out with failure after failure and now squat in his hole like the tailless fox, he is curled up to snarl and whimper beneath the inaccessible vine of song. Votes: 0

Time stoops to no man's lure. Votes: 0

A young man with a very good past. [Fr., Un jeune homme d'un bien beau passe.] Votes: 0

The delight that consumes the desire, The desire that outruns the delight. Votes: 0

Who knows but on their sleep may rise Such light as never heaven let through To lighten earth from Paradise? Votes: 0