ThursdayMay 21, 2026
Quotes: 53419 Authors: 9969
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (March 6, 1806 - June 29, 1861) was one of the most respected poets of the Victorian era.
Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished.
Who so loves believes the impossible.
Love me sweet With all thou art Feeling, thinking, seeing; Love me in the Lightest part, Love me in full Being.
By thunders of white silence.
And Chaucer, with his infantine Familiar clasp of things divine.
Some people always sigh in thanking God.
But so fair, She takes the breath of men away Who gaze upon her unaware.
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.
The devil's most devilish when respectable.
Since when was genius found respectable?
She has seen the mystery hid Under Egypt's pyramid: By those eyelids pale and close Now she knows what Rhamses knows.
Measure not the work until the day's out and the labor done.
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love thee with the passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saintsI love thee with the breadth, Smiles, tears, of all my life!and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.
Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west.
Light tomorrow with today.
What frightens me is that men are content with what is not life at all.
The sweetest lives are those to duty wed, Whose deeds, both great and small Are close-knot strands of an unbroken thread There love ennobles all. The world may sound no trumpets, ring no bells The book of life the shining record tells. Thy love shall chant its own beatitudes After its own life-workings. A childs 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 serve thyself by every sense, Of service which thou renderest.
Or from Browning some 'Pomegranate,' which if cut deep down the middle Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity.
I tell you, hopeless grief is passionless.
And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness, Round our restlessness His rest.
God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers, And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face, A gauntlet with a gift in 't.
There is no God,' the foolish saith, But none, 'There is no sorrow.' And nature oft the cry of faith In bitter need will borrow: Eyes which the preacher could not school, By wayside graves are raised; And lips say, 'God be pitiful,' Who ne'er said, 'God be praised.'
They say that God lives very high! But if you look above the pines You cannot see our God. And why? And if you dig down in the mines You never see Him in the gold, Though from Him all thats glory shines. God is so good, He wears a fold Of heaven and earth across His face Like secrets kept, for love, untold. But still I feel that His embrace Slides down by thrills, through all things made, Through sight and sound of every place: As if my tender brother laid On my shut lids, her kisses pressure, Half waking me at night; and said, 'Who kissed through the dark, dear guesser?'
But since he had The genius to be loved, why let him have The justice to be honoured in his grave.
When we first met and loved, I did not build Upon the event with marble....
And Marlowe, Webster, Fletcher, Ben, Whose fire-hearts sowed our furrows when The world was worthy of such men.
Gods gifts put mans best dreams to shame.
Earths crammed with heaven And every common bush afire with God; But only he who sees, takes off his shoes, The rest sit round it and pick blackberries, And daub their natural faces unaware More and more from the first similitude.
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!'
Death forerunneth Love to win 'Sweetest eyes were ever seen.'
There Shakespeare, on whose forehead climb The crowns o' the world; oh, eyes sublime With tears and laughter for all time!
Thou large-brain'd woman and large-hearted man.
Knowledge by suffering entereth; And Life is perfected by Death.
I think it frets the saints in heaven to see How many desolate creatures on the earth Have learnt the simple dues of fellowship And social comfort, in a hospital.
God's gifts put man's best dreams to shame.
A woman's always younger than a man of equal years.
I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out.
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