Top 497 Quotes & Sayings by Walt Whitman - Page 2

Here or henceforward it is all the same to me, I accept Time absolutely.

To the real artist in humanity, what are called bad manners are often the most picturesque and significant of all.

Produce great men, the rest follows.

A great city is that which has the greatest men and women.

The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.

I heard what was said of the universe, heard it and heard it of several thousand years; it is middling well as far as it goes - but is that all?

Let that which stood in front go behind, let that which was behind advance to the front, let bigots, fools, unclean persons, offer new propositions, let the old propositions be postponed.

Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.

I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.

I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.

And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a hero.

The proof of a poet is that his country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it.

There is that indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius.

Speech is the twin of my vision, it is unequal to measure itself, it provokes me forever, it says sarcastically, Walt you contain enough, why don't you let it out then?

O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you, you express me better than I can express myself.

Whoever degrades another degrades me, And whatever is done or said returns at last to me.

The whole purpose of the universe is unerringly aimed at one thing - you.

The President eats dirt and excrement for his daily meals, likes it and tries to force it on The States.

The earth is rude, silent, incomprehensible at first; Be not discouraged - keep on - there are divine things, well envelop'd; I swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell.

All the things of the universe are perfect miracles, each as profound as any.

The habit of giving only enhances the desire to give.

This is what you should do: love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men ... re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss what insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem.

Wisdom is not finally tested by the schools, Wisdom cannot be pass'd from one having it to another not having it, Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof.

These are the days that must happen to you.

The gift is to the giver, and comes back most to him - it cannot fail

The art of art... is simplicity.

A man can be a hero in any profession

I hate commas in the wrong places.

I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.

I celebrate myself, and sing myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

Do anything, but let it produce joy.

Be not ashamed women, ... You are the gates of the body, and you are the gates of the soul.

As for me, I know nothing else but miracles, Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan, Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky, Or wade with naked feet along the beach just in the edge of the water, Or stand under the trees in the woods, Or talk by day with any one I love, Or sleep in bed at night with any one I love, Or watch honey bees busy around the hive of a summer forenoon... Or the wonderfulness of the sundown, Or of stars shining so quiet and bright, Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in spring... What stranger miracles are there?

When one reaches out to help another he touches the face of God.

We were together. I forget the rest.

Happiness, not in another place but this place...not for another hour, but this hour.

I dream in my dreams all the dreams of the other dreamers. And I become the other dreamers.

Not I, nor anyone else can travel that road for you. You must travel it by yourself. It is not far. It is within reach. Perhaps you have been on it since you were born, and did not know. Perhaps it is everywhere - on water and land.

I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least.

I think I could turn and live with the animals, they are so placid and self contained; I stand and look at them long and long. They do not sweat and whine about their condition; They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins; They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God; Not one is dissatisfied-not one is demented with the mania of owning things; Not one kneels to another, nor his kind that lived thousands of years ago; Not one is responsible or industrious over the whole earth.

this is thy hour o soul, thy free flight into the wordless, away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done, thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best, night, sleep, death and the stars.

Love the earth and sun and animals, Despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, Stand up for the stupid and crazy, Devote your income and labor to others... And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

Each of us inevitable; Each of us limitless-each of us with his or her right upon the earth.

Resist much, obey little.

Re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.

I am not to speak to you, I am to think of you when I sit alone or wake at night alone, I am to wait, I do not doubt I am to meet you again, I am to see to it that I do not lose you.

The secret of it all, is to write in the gush, the throb, the flood, of the moment – to put things down without deliberation – without worrying about their style – without waiting for a fit time or place. I always worked that way. I took the first scrap of paper, the first doorstep, the first desk, and wrote – wrote, wrote…By writing at the instant the very heartbeat of life is caught.

Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth ever afterward resumes its liberty.

Every hour of every day is an unspeakably perfect miracle.

The truth is simple. If it was complicated, everyone would understand it.

The ecstasy is so short but the forgetting is so long.

There will never be any more perfection than there is now.

To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle. Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.

Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road. Healthy, free, the world before me. The long brown path before me leading me wherever I choose. Henceforth, I ask not good fortune, I myself am good fortune. Henceforth, I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing.

The road to wisdom is paved with excess. The mark of a true writer is their ability to mystify the familiar and familiarize the strange.

What is that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.

Either define the moment or the moment will define you.

It is only the novice in political economy who thinks it is the duty of government to make its citizens happy - government has no such office.

Those who love each other shall become invincible.