Quotes from Percy Bysshe Shelley

Men of England, heirs of Glory, Heroes of unwritten story, Nurslings of one mighty Mother, Hopes of her, and one another; Rise like Lions after slumber In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew Which in sleep had fallen on you- Ye are many — they are few

War is a kind of superstition, the pageantry of arms and badges corrupts the imagination of men.

The person who has been accustomed to subdue men by force will be less inclined to the trouble of convincing or persuading them.

To hearts which near each other move From evening close to morning light, The night is good; because, my love, They never say good-night.

The One remains, the many change and pass; Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly; Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, Stains the white radiance of Eternity, Until Death tramples it to fragments---Die, If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek!

No more alone through the world's wilderness, Although I trod the paths of high intent, I journeyed now: no more companionless

And, day and night, aloof, from the high towers and terraces, the Earth and Ocean seem to sleep in one another's arms, and dream of waves, flowers, clouds, woods, rocks, and all that we read in their smiles, and call reality.

Like the ghost of a dear friend dead Is Time long past. A tone which is now forever fled, A hope which is now forever past, A love so sweet it could not last, Was Time long past. There were sweet dreams in the night Of Time long past: And, was it sadness or delight, Each day a shadow onward cast Which made us wish it yet might last - That Time long past

Speaking the wisdom once they could not think, looking emotions once they feared to feel, and changed to all which once they dared not be, yet being now, made earth like heaven.

Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass Stains the white radiance of Eternity, Until Death tramples it to fragments. - Adonais

And beautiful, and there the sea I found Calm as a cradled child in dreamless slumber bound.

He is a presence to be felt and known In darkness and in light, from herb and stone, Spreading itself where'er that Power may move Which has withdrawn his being to its own;

The cultivation of those sciences which have enlarged the limits of the empire of man over the external world, has, for want of poetical faculty, proportionally circumscribed those of the internal world; and man, having enslaved the elements, remains himself a slave.

You must come home with and be my guest; You will give joy to me, and I will do all that is in my power to honor you.

it were as wise to cast a violet into a crucible that you might discover the formal principle of its color and odor, as seek to transfuse from one language into another the creations of a poet

Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again.

A Lament O world! O life! O time! On whose last steps I climb, Trembling at that where I had stood before; When will return the glory of your prime? No more—Oh, never more! Out of the day and night A joy has taken flight; Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar, Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight No more—Oh, never more!

Nothing in the world is single All things by law divine In one another's being mingle Why not I with thine?

Thou demandest what is love? It is that powerful attraction towards all that we conceive, or fear, or hope beyond ourselves, when we find within our own thoughts the chasm of an insufficient void, and seek to awaken in all things that are, a community with what we experience within ourselves.

Wealth and dominion fade into the mass Of the great sea of human right and wrong, When once from our possession they must pass; But love, though misdirected, is among The things which are immortal, and surpass All that frail stuff which will be - or which was.

This secret in the pregnant womb of time, Too vast a matter for so weak a rhyme.

Every fanatic or enemy of virtue is not at liberty to misrepresent the greatest geniuses and most heroic defenders of all that is valuable in this mortal world.

Whatever talents a person may possess to amuse and instruct others, be they ever so inconsiderable, he is yet bound to exert them: if his attempt be ineffectual, let the punishment of an unaccomplished purpose have been sufficient; let none trouble themselves to heap the dust of oblivion upon his efforts; the pile they raise will betray his grave which might otherwise have been unknown.

Hail to thee, blithe spirit! Bird thou never wert.