Barrett Browning Quotes & Sayings

Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no such pleasure in life! — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Children use the fist until they are of age to use the brain. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The charm, one might say the genius, of memory is that it is choosy, chancy and temperamental. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Deep violets, you liken to The kindest eyes that look on you, Without a thought disloyal. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

First time he kissed me, he but only kissed The fingers of this hand wherewith I write; And, ever since, it grew more clean and white. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Yet, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed
And worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright,
Let temple burn, or flax; an equal light
Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed:
And love is fire. And when I say at need
I love thee ... mark! ... I love thee
in thy sight
I stand transfigured, glorified aright,
With conscience of the new rays that proceed
Out of my face toward thine. There's nothing low
In love, when love the lowest: meanest creatures
Who love God, God accepts while loving so.
And what I feel, across the inferior features
Of what I am, doth flash itself, and show
How that great work of Love enhances Nature's. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I shall but love thee bitter after death — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

That headlong ivy! not a leaf will grow But thinking of a wreath, ... I like such ivy; bold to leap a height 'Twas strong to climb! as good to grow on graves As twist about a thyrsus; pretty too (And that's not ill) when twisted round a comb. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness; Round our restlessness, His rest. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I work with patience, which is almost power. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

But I love you, sir:
And when a woman says she loves a man,
The man must hear her, though he love her not. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The plague of gold strikes far and near. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And wilt thou have me fashion into speech
The love I bear thee, finding words enough,
And hold the torch out, while the winds are rough,
Between our faces, to cast light on each? -
I dropt it at thy feet. I cannot teach
My hand to hold my spirits so far off
From myself
me
that I should bring thee proof
In words, of love hid in me out of reach.
Nay, let the silence of my womanhood
Commend my woman-love to thy belief, -
Seeing that I stand unwon, however wooed,
And rend the garment of my life, in brief,
By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude,
Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Every age, Through being beheld too close, is ill-discerned By those who have not lived past it. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Yet half the beast is the great god Pan, To laugh, as he sits by the river, Making a poet out of a man. The true gods sigh for the cost and the pain
For the reed that grows never more again As a reed with the reeds of the river. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

You're something between a dream and a miracle. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Learn to win a lady's faith
Nobly, as the thing is high;
Bravely as for life and death -
With a loyal gravity.
Lead her from the festive boards,
Point her to the starry skies,
Guard her, by your truthful words,
Pure from courtship's flatteries. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I take her as God made her, and as men Must fail to unmake her, for my honoured wife. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

She lived, we'll say,
A harmless life, she called a
virtuous life,
A quiet life, which was not life at all
(But that she had not lived enough to know) — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I would not be a rose upon the wall
A queen might stop at, near the palace-door,
To say to a courtier, "Pluck that rose for me,
It's prettier than the rest." O Romney Leigh!
I'd rather far be trodden by his foot,
Than lie in a great queen's bosom. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Purple lilies Dante blew To a larger bubble with his prophet breath. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The world's male chivalry has perished out, but women are knights-errant to the last; and, if Cervantes had been greater still, he had made his Don a Donna. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The exchange of sympathy for gratitude is the most princely thing! — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

World's use is cold, world's love is vain, world's cruelty is bitter bane; but is not the fruit of pain. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The growing drama has outgrown such toys Of simulated stature, face, and speech: It also peradventure may outgrow The simulation of the painted scene, Boards, actors, prompters, gaslight, and costume, And take for a worthier stage the soul itself, Its shifting fancies and celestial lights, With all its grand orchestral silences To keep the pauses of its rhythmic sounds. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

O rose, who dares to name thee?
No longer roseate now, nor soft, nor sweet,
But pale, and hard, and dry, as stubblewheat,
Kept seven years in a drawer, thy titles shame thee. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Definition of Love: A score of zero in tennis. I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears of all my life. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Books succeed; and lives fail. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Quick-loving hearts ... may quickly loathe. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The English have a scornful insular way Of calling the French light. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And each man stands with his face in the light. Of his own drawn sword, ready to do what a hero can. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

She has seen the mystery hid Under Egypt's pyramid: By those eyelids pale and close Now she knows what Rhamses knows. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Who so loves believes the impossible. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I am one who could have forgotten the plague, listening to Boccaccio's stories; and I am not ashamed of it. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A great man leaves clean work behind him, and requires no sweeper up of the chips. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Elizabeth Barrett Browning could write a poem two pages long. Could she have brought it to a music publisher? — Dorothy Fields

Tis aye a solemn thing to me
To look upon a babe that sleeps
Wearing in its spirit-deeps
The unrevealed mystery
Of its Adam's taint and woe,
Which, when they revealed lie,
Will not let it slumber so. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

You may write twenty lines one day
or even three like Euripides in three days
and a hundred lines in one more day
and yet on the hundred, may have been expended as much good work, as on the twenty and the three. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I begin to think that none are so bold as the timid, when they are fairly roused. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And I must bear
What is ordained with patience, being aware
Necessity doth front the universe
With an invincible gesture. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Life treads on life, and heart on heart; We press too close in church and mart To keep a dream or grave apart. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The Holy Night We sate among the stalls at Bethlehem; The dumb kine from their fodder turning them, Softened their horned faces To almost human gazes Toward the newly Born: The simple shepherds from the star-lit brooks Brought visionary looks, As yet in their astonied hearing rung The strange sweet angel-tongue: The magi of the East, in sandals worn, Knelt reverent, sweeping round, With long pale beards, their gifts upon the ground, The incense, myrrh, and gold These baby hands were impotent to hold: So let all earthlies and celestials wait Upon thy royal state. Sleep, sleep, my kingly One! — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

When God helps all the workers for His world,
The singers shall have help of Him, not last. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

He's just, your cousin, ay, abhorrently, He'd wash his hands in blood, to keep them clean. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Men could not part us with their worldly jars,
Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests bend;
Our hands would touch for all the mountain-bars,
And, heaven being rolled between us at the end,
We should but vow the faster for the stars. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

For tis not in mere death that men die most. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

His ears were often the first thing to catch my tears. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: I'm with you kid. Let's go. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The devil's most devilish when respectable. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

If we tried To sink the past beneath our feet, be sure The future would not stand. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The wisest word man reaches is the humblest he can speak. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Love that endures, from life that disappears! — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A good neighbor sometimes cuts your morning up to mince-meat of the very smallest talk, then helps to sugar her bohea at night with your reputation. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Will that light come again,
As now these tears come ... falling hot and real! — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Through heaven and earth
God's will moves freely, and I follow it,
As color follows light. He overflows
The firmamental walls with deity,
Therefore with love; His lightnings go abroad,
His pity may do so, His angels must,
Whene'er He gives them charges. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I thought once how Theocritus had sung
Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,
Who each one in a gracious hand appears
To bear a gift for mortals, old or young;
And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,
I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. Straightaway I was 'ware,
So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move
Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,
Guess now who holds thee?
Death, I said, But, there,
The silver answer rang,
Not Death, but Love. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And lips say God be pitiful, who never said, God be praised. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

God's gifts put men's best dreams to shame. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And that dismal cry rose slowly And sank slowly through the air, Full of spirit's melancholy And eternity's despair; And they heard the words it said,- "Pan is dead! great Pan is dead! Pan, Pan is dead!" — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Get leave to work In this world,
'tis the best you get at all. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Since when was genius found respectable? — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

God's gifts put man's best dreams to shame. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XI
I sang his name instead of song;
Over and over I sang his name:
Backward and forward I sang it along,
With my sweetest notes, it was still the same!
I sang it low, that the slave-girls near
Might never guess, from what they could hear,
That all the song was a name. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Wall must get the weather stain Before they grow the ivy. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The least flower, with brimming cup, may stand and share its dew drop with another near. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Souls are dangerous things to carry straight through all the spilt saltpetre of this world. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The chances are that, being a woman, young,
And pure, with such a pair of large, calm eyes,
You write as well ... and ill ... upon the whole,
As other women. If as well, what then?
If even a little better,..still, what then?
We want the Best in art now, or no art. (L144-149) — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

There, that is our secret: go to sleep! You will wake, and remember, and understand. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Unlike we are, unlike, O princely Heart!
Unlike our uses and our destinies ...
Thou, bethink thee, art
A guest for queens to social pageantries,
With gages from a hundred brighter eyes
Than tears even can make mine ...
What hast though to do
With looking from the lattice-lights at me,
A poor, tired, wandering singer ... — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Better far
Pursue a frivolous trade by serious means,
Than a sublime art frivolously. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A woman is always younger than a man at equal years. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

An ignorance of means may minister to greatness, but an ignorance of aims make it impossible to be great at all. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A cheerful genius suits the times, / And all true poets laugh unquenchably / Like Shakespeare and the gods. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

We have hearts within, Warm, live, improvident, indecent hearts. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And I breathe large at home. I drop my cloak,
Unclasp my girdle, loose the band that ties
My hair ... now could I but unloose my soul!
We are sepulchred alive in this close world,
And want more room. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The critics could never mortify me out of heart - because I love poetry for its own sake, - and, tho' with no stoicism and some ambition, care more for my poems than for my poetic reputation. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Silence is the best response to a fool ... — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

My patience has dreadful chilblains from standing so long on a monument. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Of all the thoughts of God that are Borne inward unto souls afar, Along the Psalmist's music deep, Now tell me if that any is. For gift or grace, surpassing this
He giveth His beloved sleep. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Every wish Is like a prayer
with God. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How joyously the young sea-mew
Lay dreaming on the waters blue,
Whereon our little bark had thrown
A little shade, the only one;
But shadows ever man pursue. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Even his sleep was full of dreams. He dreamt as he had not dreamt since the old days at Three Mile Cross - of hares starting from the long grass; of pheasants rocketing up with long tails streaming, of partridges rising with a whirr from the stubble. He dreamt that he was hunting, that he was chasing some spotted spaniel, who fled, who escaped him. He was in Spain; he was in Wales; he was in Berkshire; he was flying before park-keepers' truncheons in Regent's Park. Then he opened his eyes. There were no hares, and no partridges; no whips cracking and no black men crying "Span! Span!"

There was only Mr. Browning in the armchair talking to Miss Barrett on the sofa. — Virginia Woolf

God Himself is the best Poet, And the Real is His song. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

For poets (bear the word) Half-poets even, are still whole democrats. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A child's kiss Set on thy sighing lips shall make thee glad; A poor man served by thee shall make thee rich; A sick man helped by thee shall make thee strong; Thou shalt be served thyself by every sense Of service which thou renderest. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

O Earth, so full of dreary noises!
O men, with wailing in your voices!
O delved gold, the wader's heap!
O strife, O curse, that o'er it fall!
God makes a silence through you all,
And giveth His beloved, sleep. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

And there my little doves did sit With feathers softly brown And glittering eyes that showed their right To general Nature's deep delight. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Unless you can feel when the song is done
No other is sweet in its rhythm;
Unless you can feel when left by one
That all men else go with him. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

What monster have we here? A great Deed at this hour of day? A great just deed - and not for pay? Absurd - or insincere? — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Too much beauty, I reckon, is nothing but too much sun. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I wish I were the lily's leaf To fade upon that bosom warm, Content to wither, pale and brief, The trophy of thy paler form. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Get work: Be sure it is better than what you work to get. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

OF writing many books there is no end;
And I who have written much in prose and verse
For others' uses, will write now for mine,-
Will write my story for my better self,
As when you paint your portrait for a friend,
Who keeps it in a drawer and looks at it
Long after he has ceased to love you, just
To hold together what he was and is. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

There's a line in The Barretts of Wimpole Street - you know, the play - where Elizabeth Barrett is trying to work out the meaning of one of Robert Browning's poems, and she shows it to him, and he reads it and he tells her when he wrote that poem, only God and Robert Browning knew what it meant, and now only God knows. And that's how I feel about studying English. Who knows what the writer was thinking, and why should it matter? I'd rather just read for enjoyment. — Susanna Kearsley

What is art but the life upon the larger scale, the higher. When, graduating up in a spiral line of still expanding and ascending gyres, it pushes toward the intense significance of all things, hungry for the infinite? — Elizabeth Barrett Browning