Tennyson Alfred Quotes & Sayings

An English homegrey twilight poured On dewy pasture, dewy trees, Softer than sleepall things in order stored, A haunt of ancient Peace. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

What rights are those that dare not resist for them? — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Those who depend on the merits of their ancestors may be said to search in the roots of the tree for those fruits which the branches ought to produce. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

My doom is, I love thee still.
Let no man dream but that I love thee still. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Manners are not idle, but the fruit of loyal and of noble mind. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Not wholly in the busy world, nor quite
Beyond it, blooms the garden that I love.
News from the humming city comes to it
It sound of funeral or of marriage bells. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

She left the web, she left the loom, She made three paces through the room — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer Than this world dreams of: Wherefore, let they voice, Rise like a fountain for me night and day. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

The dream Dreamed by a happy man, when the dark East, Unseen, is brightening to his bridal morn. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Who loves not Knowledge? Who shall rail
Against her beauty? May she mix
With men and prosper! Who shall fix
Her pillars? Let her work prevail. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

O last regret, regret can die! — Alfred Lord Tennyson

I fain would follow love, if that could be;
I needs must follow death, who calls for me;
Call and I follow, I follow! let me die. — Alfred Tennyson

A man had given all other bliss, And all his worldly worth for this To waste his whole heart in one kiss Upon her perfect lips. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

For this alone on Death I wreak The wrath that garners in my heart: He put our lives so far apart We cannot hear each other speak. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

It may be that no life is found, Which only to one engine bound Falls off, but cycles always round. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Like glimpses of forgotten dreams. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

I envy not in any moods The captive void of noble rage, The linnet born within the cage, That never knew the summer woods. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

France had shown a light to all men, preached a Gospel, all men's good; Celtic Demos rose a Demon, shriek'd and slaked the light with blood. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

The Oak

Live thy Life,
Young and old,
Like yon oak,
Bright in spring,
Living gold;

Summer-rich
Then; and then
Autumn-changed
Soberer-hued
Gold again.

All his leaves
Fall'n at length,
Look, he stands,
Trunk and bough
Naked strength. — Alfred Tennyson

Be thou as the immortal are, Who dwell beneath their God's own wing A spirit of light, a living star, A holy and a searchless thing: But oh! forget not those who mourn, Because thou canst no more return. — Alfred Tennyson

Four grey walls, and four grey towers, Overlook a space of flowers, And the silent isle imbowers The Lady of Shalott. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds,
At last he beat his music out.
There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.


He fought his doubts and gather'd strength,
He would not make his judgment blind,
He faced the spectres of the mind
And laid them: thus he came at length


To find a stronger faith his own;
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone, — Alfred Tennyson

What are men better than sheep or goats That nourish a blind life within the brain, If knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer Both for themselves and those who call them friend? — Alfred Lord Tennyson

The smell of violets, hidden in the green, Pour'd back into my empty soul and frame The times when I remembered to have been Joyful and free from blame. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

If Nature put not forth her power About the opening of the flower, Who is it that could live an hour? — Alfred Lord Tennyson

A beam in darkness: let it grow. — Alfred Tennyson

As the husband is, the wife is. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

It was my duty to have loved the highest; It surely was my profit had I known: It would have been my pleasure had I seen. We needs must love the highest when we see it, Not Lancelot, nor another. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

What! I should call on that Infinite Love that has served us so well? Infinite cruelty rather, that made everlasting hell, Made us, foreknew us, foredoom'd us, and does what he will with his own; Better our dead brute mother who never has heard us groan. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

God's finger touched him, and he slept. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
She is coming, my dove, my dear;
She is coming, my life, my fate;
The red rose cries, "She is near, she is near;"
And the white rose weeps, "She is late;"
The larkspur listens, "I hear; I hear;"
And the lily whispers, "I wait." — Alfred Lord Tennyson

For every worm beneath the moon Draws different threads, and late and soon Spins, toiling out his own cocoon. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Only reapers, reaping early In among the bearded barley, Hear a song that echoes cheerly From the river winding clearly, Down to towered Camelot. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Sin is too stupid to see beyond itself. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

after all had eaten, then Geraint, For now the wine made summer in his veins, Let his eye rove in following, or rest On Enid at her lowly handmaid-work, — Alfred Tennyson

A daughter of the gods, divinely tall, And most divinely fair. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

So I find every pleasant spot In which we two were wont to meet, The field, the chamber, and the street, For all is dark where thou art not — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering, 'It will be happier.' — Alfred Lord Tennyson

As the husband is the wife is; thou art mated with a clown, As the grossness of his nature will have weight to drag thee down. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

There is sweet music here that softer falls Than petals from blown roses on the grass, ... — Alfred Lord Tennyson

But I remain'd, whose hopes were dim,
Whose life, whose thoughts were little worth,
To wander on a darken'd earth,
Where all things round me breathed of him. — Alfred Tennyson

The Gods themselves cannot recall their gifts. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

The old order changes yielding place to new. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles whom we knew. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Trust me not at all, or all in all. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

In time there is no present, In eternity no future, In eternity no past. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Better not to be at all Than not to be noble. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

For I dipped into the future, far as human eye could see, Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

For this is England's greatest son, He that gain'd a hundred fights, And never lost an English gun. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Never comes the trader, never floats an European flag, -
Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings the trailer from the crag, -

Droops the heavy-blossomed bower, hangs the heavy-fruited tree, -
Summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple spheres of sea. — Alfred Tennyson

That man's the best cosmopolite Who loves his native country best. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams? — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Because right is right, to follow right Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Love is the only gold. — Alfred Tennyson

Their's not to make reply, Their's not to reason why, Their's but to do and die: Into — Alfred Tennyson

So now I have sworn to bury All this dead body of hate I feel so free and so clear By the loss of that dead weight — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Let us hush this cry of 'Forward', till ten thousand years have gone. — Alfred Tennyson

For why is all around us here As if some lesser god had made the world, But had not force to shape it as he would? Alfred Lord Tennyson: Idylls of the King — K.H. Rennie

It is hard to wive and thrive both in a year. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Shall eagles not be eagles? wrens be wrens? If all the world were falcons, what of that? The wonder of the eagle were the less, But he not less the eagle. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

She saw the snowy poles of moonless Mars, That marvellous round of milky light Below Orion, and those double stars Whereof the one more bright

Is circled by the other — Alfred Tennyson

Praise to our Indian brothers, and the dark face have his due!
Thanks to the kindly dark faces who fought with us, faithful and few,
Fought with the bravest among us, and drove them, and smote them, and slew.
That ever upon the topment roof our banner in India blew. — Alfred Tennyson

That tower of strength Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
"Ulysses" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson — Alfred Tennyson

But every page having an ample marge, And every marge enclosing in the midst A square of text that looks a little blot. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Either sex alone is half itself. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Arise, go forth, and conquer as of old. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

I waited for the train at Coventry; I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge, To watch the three tall spires; and there I shaped The city's ancient legend into this. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Of happy men that have the power to die, And grassy barrows of the happier dead. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

He will hold thee, when his passion shall have spent its novel force, Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

I know that age to age succeeds, Blowing a noise of tongues and deeds, A dust of systems and of creeds. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

The noonday quiet holds the hill. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

I found Him in the shining of the stars,
I marked Him in the flowering of His fields,
But in His ways with men I find Him not.
I waged His wars, and now I pass and die.
O me! for why is all around us here
As if some lesser god had made the world,
But had not force to shape it as he would,
Till the High God behold it from beyond,
And enter it, and make it beautiful? — Alfred Tennyson

Bible reading is an education in itself. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Virtue must shape itself in deed. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a daughter's heart. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Nature, red in tooth and claw. — Alfred Tennyson

Read my little fable: He that runs may read. Most can raise the flowers now, For all have got the seed. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Big results require big ambitions. Aim high. Behave honorably. Prepare to be alone at times, and to endure failure. Persist! The world needs all you can give. To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. - ALFRED LORD TENNYSON — Bob Proctor

We needs must love the highest when we see it. — Alfred Tennyson

We love but while we may;
And therefore is my love so large for thee,
Seeing it is not bounded save by love. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

...and Gareth bowed himself with all obedience to the King, and wrought
All kind of service with a noble ease
That graced the lowliest act in doing it. — Alfred Tennyson

The children born of thee are sword and fire,
Red ruin, and the breaking up of laws, — Alfred Tennyson

He makes no friends who never made a foe. — Alfred Tennyson

Ring out the false, ring in the true. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

And is it that the haze of grief
Makes former gladness loom so great?
The lowness of the present state,
That sets the past in this relief?

Or that the past will always win
A glory from its being far;
And orb into the perfect star
We saw not when we moved therein? — Alfred Tennyson

The folly of all follies is to be love sick for a shadow. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

A doubtful throne is ice on summer seas. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

My mind is clouded with a doubt. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Love's arms were wreathed about the neck of Hope,
And Hope kiss'd Love, and Love drew in her breath
In that close kiss and drank her whisper'd tales.
They said that Love would die when Hope was gone.
And Love mourn'd long, and sorrow'd after Hope;
At last she sought out Memory, and they trod
The same old paths where Love had walked with Hope,
And Memory fed the soul of Love with tears. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Ours is not to wonder why. Ours is just to do or die. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

There's no glory like those who save their country. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

So word by word, and line by line,
The dead man touch'd me from the past,
And all at once it seem'd at last
The living soul was flash'd on mine,


And mine in his was wound, and whirl'd
About empyreal heights of thought,
And came on that which is, and caught
The deep pulsations of the world,


Aeonian music measuring out
The steps of Time - the shocks of Chance--
The blows of Death. At length my trance
Was cancell'd, stricken thro' with doubt. — Alfred Tennyson

Oh for someone with a heart, head and hand. Whatever they call them, what do I care, aristocrat, democrat, autocrat, just be it one that can rule and dare not lie. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Tis held that sorrow makes us wise. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Not once or twice in our rough island story, The path of duty was the way to glory. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Happy he With such a mother! faith in womankind Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high Comes easy to him; and tho' he trip and fall, He shall not blind his soul with clay. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

All day within the dreamy house,
The doors upon their hinges creaked;
The blue fly sang in the pane; the mouse
Behind the mouldering wainscot shrieked,
Or from the crevice peered about.
Old faces glimmered through the doors,
Old footsteps trod the upper floors,
Old voices called her from without. . . . — Alfred Tennyson

All things are taken from us, and become Portions and parcels of the dreadful past. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depths of some devine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy autumn fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. — Alfred Lord Tennyson