John Clare Quotes

If life had a second edition, how I would correct the proofs.

Language has not the power to speak what love indites: The soul lies buried in the ink that writes.

I found the poems in the fields And only wrote them down

Love lives with Nature, not with lust. Go find her in the flowers.

The best way to avoid a bad action is by doing a good one, for there is no difficulty in the world like that of trying to do nothing.

The present is the funeral of the past, And man the living sepulchre of life.

I ne'er was struck before that hour with love so sudden and so sweet. Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower and stole my heart away complete

Burning hot is the ground, liquid gold is the air; Whoever looks round sees Eternity there.

For Nature is love, and finds haunts for true love, Where nothing can hear or intrude; It hides from the eagle and joins with the dove, In beautiful green solitude.

I long for scenes where man has never trod;... There to abide with my Creator, God.

I never saw so sweet a face. As that I stood before. My heart has left it dwelling place ... and can return no more.

Still, I have been no one's enemy but my own. My easy nature, either in drinking or anything else, was always ready to submit to persuasions of profligate companions, who often led me into snares.

I am gennerally understood tho I do not use that awkward squad of pointings called commas colons semicolons etc.

This world has suns, but they are overcast;This world has sweets, but they're of ling'ring bloom;Life still expects, and empty falls at last;Warm Hope on tiptoe drops into the tomb.

Crowded places, I shunned them as noises too rude / And flew to the silence of sweet solitude.

So dull and dark are the November days. The lazy mist high up the evening curled, And now the morn quite hides in smoke and haze; The place we occupy seems all the world.

He could not die when the trees were green, For he loved the time too well.

Old April wanes, and her last dewy morn Her death-bed steeps in tears; to hail the May New blooming blossoms neath the sun are born, And all poor April's charms are swept away.

My fears are agitated to an extreme degree and the dread of death involves me in a stupor of chilling indisposition.

Ah, words are poor receipts for what time hath stole away.

Tasteful illumination of the night, Bright scattered, twinkling star of spangled earth.

How oft a summer shower has started me; to seek the shelter of a hollow tree

I am the self-consumer of my woes.

In mid-wood silence, thus, how sweet to be; Where all the noises, that on peace intrude, Come from the chittering cricket, bird, and bee, Whose songs have charms to sweeten solitude.

Yet simple souls, their faith it knows no stint: Things least to be believed are most preferred. All counterfeits, as from truth's sacred mint, Are readily believed if once put down in print

When trouble haunts me, need I sigh?No, rather smile away despair

I lost the love of heaven above I spurned the lust of earth below I felt the sweets of fancied love And hell itself my only foe.

I was Byron and Shakespeare formerly.

Throw not my words away, as many do;They're gold in value, though they're cheap to you.

Old noted oak! I saw thee in a mood Of vague indifference; and yet with me Thy memory, like thy fate, hath lingering stood For years, thou hermit, in the lonely sea Of grass that waves around thee!

To-morrow comes, true copy of to-day,And empty shadow of what is to be;Yet cheated Hope on future still depends,And ends but only when our being ends.

Wildness is my suiting scene.

And what is Life? - An hour-glass on the run

He could not die when trees were green, for he loved the time too well.

I hate the very noise of troublous man Who did and does me all the harm he can. Free from the world I would a prisoner be And my own shadow all my company.

Yet simple souls, their faith it knows no stint:Things least to be believed are most preferred.All counterfeits, as from truth's sacred mint, Are readily believed if once put down in print

O lead me onward to the loneliest shade, The darkest place that quiet ever made, Where kingcups grow most beauteous to behold And shut up green and open into gold.

Crowded places, I shunned them as noises too rudeAnd fled to the silence of sweet solitude.

Language has not the power to speak what love inditesThe soul lies buried in the Ink that writes

O words are poor receipts for what time hath stole away

I found the poems in the fields, And only wrote them down.

In crime and enmity they lie Who sin and tell us love can die, Who say to us in slander's breath That love belongs to sin and death.

There is a charm in Solitude that cheersA feeling that the world knows nothing ofA green delight the wounded mind endearsAfter the hustling world is broken off