Quotes from T.S. Eliot

Endless invention, endless experiment, Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness; Knowledge of speech, but not of silence; Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word. Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

No poet, no artist of any art, has his complete meaning alone. His significance, his appreciation is the appreciation of his relation to the dead poets and artists. You cannot value him alone; you must set him, for contrast and comparison, among the dead. I mean this as a principle of aesthetic, not merely historical, criticism.

I said to my soul be still, and wait without hope; for hope would be hope for the wrong thing.

that's not what I meant at all... that's not it at all.

Everyone's alone—or so it seems to me. They make noises, and think they are talking to each other; They make faces, and think they understand each other, And I'm sure they don't. Is that delusion? Can we only love Something created in our own imaginations?

I gotta use words to talk to you.

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I sat upon the shore Fishing, with the arid plain behind me Shall I at least set my lands in order? London Bridge is falling down falling down falling down Poi s'ascose nel foco che gli affina Quando fiam ceu chelidon—O swallow swallow

We might remind ourselves that criticism is as inevitable as breathing, and that we should be none the worse for articulating what passes in our minds,... for criticizing our own minds in their work of criticism.

The eyes are not here There are no eyes here In this valley of dying stars In this hollow valley This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

What might have been is an abstraction Remaining a perpetual possibility Only in a world of speculation.

He is haunted by a demon, a demon against which he feels powerless, because in its first manifestation it has no face, no name, nothing; and the words, the poem he makes, are a kind of exorcism of this demon.

Time present and time past / are both perhaps present in time future.

Oh my soul, be prepared for the coming of the Stranger. Be prepared for him who knows how to ask questions. There is one who remembers the way to your door: Life you may evade, but Death you shall not. You shall not deny the Stranger. They constantly try to escape From the darkness outside and within By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good. But the man that is shall shadow The man that pretends to be.

No place of grace for those who avoid the face No time to rejoice for those who walk among noise and deny the voice

I would meet you upon this honestly. I that was near your heart was removed therefrom To lose beauty in terror, terror in inquisition. I have lost my passion: why should I need to keep it Since what is kept must be adulterated? I have lost my sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch: How should I use them for your closer contact?

Most of the trouble in the world is caused by people wanting to be important.

life is long between the desire and the spasm.

Half the harm that is done in this world Is due to people who want to feel important.

Your burden is not to clear your conscience But to learn how to bear the burdens on your conscience.

What profession is more trying than that of author? After you finish a piece of work it only seems good to you for a few weeks; or if it seems good at all you are convinced that it is the last you will be able to write; and if it seems bad you wonder whether everything you have done isn't poor stuff really; and it is one kind of agony while you are writing, and another kind when you aren't.

And the end and the beginning where always there, before the beginning and after the end.

Destiny waits in the hand of god, shaping the still unshapen..

The very existence of libraries affords the best evidence that we may yet have hope for the future of man.