W.B. Yeats Quotes

How could passion run so deep Had I never thought That the crime of being born Blackens all our lot?

But O, sick children of the world, Of all the many changing things In dreary dancing past us whirled, To the cracked tune that Chronos sings, Words alone are certain good.

Never shall a young man, Thrown into despair By those great honey-coloured Ramparts at your ear, Love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair.

For what but eye and ear silence the mind With the minute particulars of mankind?

Where the world ends The mind is made unchanging, for it finds Miracle, ecstasy, the impossible hope, The flagstone under all, the fire of fires, The roots of the world.

Bodies of holy men and women exude Miraculous oil, odour of violet. But under heavy loads of trampled clay Lie bodies of the vampires full of blood; Their shrouds are bloody and their lips are wet.

When we are high and airy hundreds say That if we hold that flight they'll leave the place, While those same hundreds mock another day Because we have made our art of common things.

My wretched dragon is perplexed.

Now must we sing and sing the best we can, But first you must be told your character: Convicted cowards all, by kindred slain.

Once more the storm is howling, and half hid Under this cradle-hood and coverlid My child sleeps on.

I--love's skein upon the ground, My body in the tomb-- Shall leap into the light lost In my mother's womb.

The common breeds the common, A lout begets a lout, So when I take on half a score I knock their heads about.

I whispered, 'I am too young,' and then, 'I am old enough'; wherefore I threw a penny to find out if I might love.

Acquaintance; companion; One dear brilliant woman; The best-endowed, the elect, All by their youth undone, All, all, by that inhuman Bitter glory wrecked.

When we have blamed the wind we can blame love.

A speckled cat and a tame hare Eat at my hearthstone And sleep there; And both look up to me alone For learning and defence As I look up to Providence.

I weave the shoes of Sorrow: Soundless shall be the footfall light In all men's ears of Sorrow, Sudden and light.

A mouth that has no moisture and no breath Breathless mouths may summon; I hail the superhuman; I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.

O would, beloved, that you lay Under the dock-leaves in the ground, While lights were paling one by one.

Come away, O human child!To the waters and the wildWith a faery, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

When you are old and grey and full of sleep And nodding by the fire, take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of the soft look Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep

How far away the stars seem, and how farIs our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart!

All is changed, changed utterlyA terrible beauty is born

Heart-mysteries there, and yet when all is saidIt was the dream itself enchanted me("The Circus Animal's Desertion")

O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer, Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?O body swayed to music, O brightening glance, How can we know the dancer from the dance?

To long a sacrifice can make a stone of a heart

Wine enters through the mouth, Love, the eyes.I raise the glass to my mouth, I look at you, I sigh.

An aged man is but a paltry thing, A tattered coat upon a stick, unlessSoul clap its hands and sing, and louder singFor every tatter in its mortal dress

I bring you with reverent handsThe books of my numberless dreams.

I spit into the face of Time That has transfigured me.

In dreams begin responsibilities.

In dreams begin responsibilities

I have just read a long novel by Henry James. Much of it made me think of the priest condemned for a long space to confess nuns.

I carry the Sun in a Golden Cup, the Moon in a Silver Bag.

Faeries, come take me out of this dull world, For I would ride with you upon the wind, Run on the top of the dishevelled tide, And dance upon the mountains like a flame.

The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams

Never shall a young man, Thrown into despairBy those great honey-colouredRamparts at your ear, Love you for yourself aloneAnd not your yellow hair.

Just do it. Now.

Jonathan Swift made a soul for the gentlemen of this city by hating his neighbor as himself.

I heard the old, old, men say 'all that's beautiful drifts away, like the waters.

It takes more courage to examine the dark corners of your own soul than it does for a soldier to fight on a battlefield

I am persuaded that our intellects at twenty contain all the truths we shall ever find

Labour is blossoming or dancing whereThe body is not bruised to pleasure soul.

Surely some revelation is at hand.

Why, what could she have done, being what she is? Was there another Troy for her to burn?

To me the charm of an encyclopedia is that it knows - and I needn't.

Style personality - deliberately adopted and therefore a mask - is the only escape from the hot-faced bargainers and money-changers.

The best lack all conviction while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.

Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.