Quotes from Edgar Lee Masters

How shall the soul of a man be larger than the life he has lived?

Beware of the man who rises to power from one suspender.

Those who first oppose a good work, seize it and make it their own, when the cornerstone is laid and memorial tablets are erected.

To put meaning in one's life may end in madness, But life without meaning is the torture Of restlessness and vague desire-It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.

There is the silence of age, too full of wisdom for the tongue to utter it in words intelligible to those who have not lived the great range of life.

. . . the weal of the race, and the cause of humanity, here and now, are enough To give life meaning and death as well.

Out of me unworthy and unknownThe vibrations of deathless music.

Degenerate sons and daughters,Life is too strong for you—It takes life to love life.

I am Anne Rutledge who sleep beneath these weeds,Beloved in life of Abraham Lincoln.

But here by the mill the castled clouds Mocked themselves in the dizzy water...

All, all, are sleeping on the hill.

Genius is a bend in the creek where bright water has gathered, and which mirrors the trees, the sky and the banks. It just does that because it is there and the scenery is there. Talent is a fine mirror with a silver frame, with the name of the owner engraved on the back.

To this generation I would say: Memorize some bit of verse of truth or beauty.

To put meaning in one's life may end in madness, But life without meaning is the torture Of restlessness and vague desire-- It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.

The tongue may be an unruly member-- But silence poisons the soul.

In time you shall see Fate approach you In the shape of your own image in the mirror.

And I never started to plow in my life That some one did not stop in the road And take me away to a dance or picnic. I ended up with forty acres; I ended up with a broken fiddle— And a broken laugh, and a thousand memories, And not a single regret.

What is this I hear of sorrow and weariness, Anger, discontent and drooping hopes? Degenerate sons and daughters, Life is too strong for you— It takes life to love Life.

the much-sought prize of eternal youth Is just arrested growth.

It takes life to love life.

There is no marriage in Heaven, but there is love.

I tramped through the country To get the feeling That I was not a separate thing from the earth. I used to lose myself By lying with eyes half-open in the woods. Sometimes I talked with animals…

The earth keeps some vibration going There in your heart, and that is you. And if the people find you can fiddle, why fiddle you must, for all your life.

The snows and the roses of yesterday are vanished; And what is love but a rose that fades?