John Greenleaf Whittier Quotes

45 Quotes Sorted by Search Results (Descending)

About John Greenleaf Whittier

John Greenleaf Whittier (17 December 1807 – 7 September 1892) was an American Quaker poet and abolitionist.

Born: December 17th, 1807

Died: September 7th, 1892

Categories: Abolitionists, Activists, American poets, Quakers, People from Massachusetts

Quotes: 45 sourced quotes total

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Words (count)215 - 55
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Shoot, if you must, this old gray head, But spare your country's flag," she said.
John Greenleaf Whittier
Barbara Frietchie (1863); reported in Diane Ravitch, The American Reader: words that moved a nation (2000), p. 259. The lines are based on an folkloric account of the real Barbara Fritchie, said to have made a similar challenge to Confederate invaders of Maryland during the American Civil War.
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes)
I know not where His islands lift Their fronded palms in air; I only know I cannot drift Beyond His love and care.
Beauty seen is never lost.
When faith is lost, when honor dies The man is dead!
God is and all is well.
Life is ever lord of Death And Love can never lose its own.
A manly form at her side she saw, And joy was duty and love was law. Then she took up her burden of life again, Saying only, "It might have been".
Weary lawyers with endless tongues.
O, brother man! fold to thy heart thy brother; where pity dwells, the peace of God is there.
Somehow not only for Christmas But all the long year through, The joy that you give to others Is the joy that comes back to you. And the more you spend in blessing The poor and lonely and sad, The more of your heart's possessing Returns to make you glad.
Making their lives a prayer.
Tradition wears a snowy beard, romance is always young.
So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on, And Maud was left in the field alone. But the lawyers smiled that afternoon, When he hummed in court an old love-tune
He wedded a wife of richest dower, Who lived for fashion, as he for power. Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow, He watched a picture come and go: And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes Looked out in their innocent surprise.
Perish with him the folly that seeks through evil good.
Alas for maiden, alas for Judge, For rich repiner and household drudge! God pity them both! and pity us all, Who vainly the dreams of youth recall; For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
John Greenleaf Whittier
• Bret Harte wrote a famous parody of this famous poem, "Mrs. Judge Jenkins" in which the Judge marries Maud, and which he ends with the lines:
''Maud soon thought the Judge a bore,
With all his learning and all his lore;
And the Judge would have bartered Maud's fair face
For more refinement and social grace.
If, of all words of tongue and pen,
The saddest are, "It might have been,"
More sad are these we daily see:
"It is, but hadn't ought to be".
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes, Maud Muller (1856))
Each crisis brings its word and deed.
Nature speaks in symbols and in signs.
The windows of my soul I throw Wide open to the sun.
Let the thick curtain fall; I better know than all How little I have gained, How vast the unattained.
The harp at Nature's advent strung Has never ceased to play; The song the stars of morning sung Has never died away.
Give lettered pomp to teeth of Time, So "Bonnie Doon" but tarry; Blot out the epic’s stately rhyme, But spare his "Highland Mary!"
Sweeter than any sung My songs that found no tongue; Nobler than any fact My wish that failed of act. Others shall sing the song, Others shall right the wrong,— Finish what I begin, And all I fail of win.
The hope of all who suffer, The dread of all who wrong.
Who never wins can rarely lose, Who never climbs as rarely falls.
Low stir of leaves and dip of oars And lapsing waves on quiet shores.
So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn Which once he wore; The glory from his gray hairs gone For evermore!
The Night is Mother of the Day, The Winter of the Spring, And ever upon old Decay The greenest mosses cling.
We seemed to see our flag unfurled, Our champion waiting in his place For the last battle of the world, The Armageddon of the race.
All hearts confess the saints elect, Who, twain in faith, in love agree, And melt not in an acid sect The Christian pearl of charity!
Maud Muller, on a summer's day, Raked the meadows sweet with hay. Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth Of simple beauty and rustic health.
Yet sometimes glimpses on my sight, Through present wrong the eternal right; And, step by step, since time began, I see the steady gain of man;
We lack but open eye and ear To find the Orient's marvels here; The still small voice in autumn's hush, Yon maple wood the burning bush.
As yonder tower outstretches to the earth The dark triangle of its shade alone When the clear day is shining on its top; So, darkness in the pathway of man's life Is but the shadow of God's providence, By the great Sun of wisdom cast thereon; And what is dark below is light in heaven.
John Greenleaf Whittier
• P. 282.
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895): Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).)
Better heresy of doctrine than heresy of heart.
Again the shadow moveth o'er The dial-plate of time.
Falsehoods which we spurn to-day Were the truths of long ago.
To eat the lotus of the Nile And drink the poppies of Cathay.
The Beauty which old Greece or Rome Sung, painted, wrought, lies close at home.
For they the mind of Christ discern Who lean, like John, upon His breast.
John Greenleaf Whittier
• P. 399.
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895): Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).)
God blesses still the generous thought, And still the fitting word He speeds, And Truth, at His requiring taught, He quickens into deeds.
Press bravely onward! — not in vain Your generous trust in human kind; The good which bloodshed could not gain Your peaceful zeal shall find.
God's ways seem dark, but, soon or late, They touch the shining hills of day; The evil cannot brook delay, The good can well afford to wait.
John Greenleaf Whittier
• P. 282.
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895): Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).)
Strike! Thou the Master, we Thy keys, The anthem of the destinies! The minor of Thy loftier strain, Our hearts shall breathe the old refrain — "Thy will be done!"
John Greenleaf Whittier
• P. 513.
• Source: Wikiquote: "John Greenleaf Whittier" (Quotes, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895): Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).)
What is good looking, as Horace Smith remarks, but looking good? Be good, be womanly, be gentle,—generous in your sympathies, heedful of the well-being of all around you; and, my word for it, you will not lack kind words of admiration.

End John Greenleaf Whittier Quotes