Quotes from Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Until you understand a writer's ignorance, presume yourself ignorant of his understanding.

If you would stand well with a great mind, leave him with a favorable impression of yourself; if with a little mind, leave him with a favorable impression of himself.

The one red leaf, the last of its clan, That dances as often as dance it can, Hanging so light, and hanging so high, On the topmost twig that looks up at the sky.

He prayeth best who loveth best, all things both great and small.

Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, Whether the summer clothe the general earth With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch Of mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatch Smokes in the sun-thaw; whether the eave-drops fall Heard only in the trances of the blast, Or if the secret ministry of frost Shall hang them up in silent icicles, Quietly shining to the quiet Moon.

Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing, Beloved from pole to pole! To Mary Queen the praise be given! She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven, That slid into my soul.

They stood aloof the scars remaining. Like cliffs which had been rent asunder.

Nature has her proper interest; and he will know what it is, who believes and feels, that every thing has a life of its own, and that we are all one life.

Day after day, day after day, we stuck nor breath nor motion As idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean Water, water everywhere and all the boards did shrink Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink.

Willing Suspension of Disbelief

And in Life's noisiest hour, There whispers still the ceaseless Love of Thee, The heart's Self-solace and soliloquy. You mould my Hopes, you fashion me within ; And to the leading Love-throb in the Heart Thro' all my Being, thro' my pulse's beat ; You lie in all my many Thoughts, like Light, Like the fair light of Dawn, or summer Eve On rippling Stream, or cloud-reflecting Lake. And looking to the Heaven, that bends above you, How oft! I bless the Lot that made me love you.

The reader should be carried forward, not merely or chiefly by the mechanical impulse of curiosity, or by a restless desire to arrive at the final solution; but by the pleasurable activity of mind excited by the attractions of the journey itself.

A savage place! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

Not one man in a thousand has the strength of mind or the goodness of heart to be an atheist.

I look'd to Heav'n, and try'd to pray; But or ever a prayer had gusht, A wicked whisper came and made My heart as dry as dust.

What is an Epigram? A dwarfish whole, Its body brevity, and wit its soul.

A sight to dream of, not to tell!

Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white, Glimmered the white moonshine. [...] Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean.

I should much wish, like the Indian Vishna, to float along an infinite ocean cradled in the flower of the Lotus, and wake once in a million years for a few minutes – just to know that I was going to sleep a million years more.

And I had done a hellish thing, And it would work 'em woe: For all averred, I had killed the bird That made the breeze to blow. Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay, That made the breeze to blow!

The frost performs its secret ministry, Unhelped by any wind.

Friendship is a sheltering tree.

Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread, For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drank the milk of Paradise.

Alas! they had been friends in youth; But whispering tongues can poison truth; And constancy lives in realms above; And life is thorny; and youth is vain; And to be wroth with one we love Doth work like madness in the brain.