Quote

Existence is not itself a good thing, that we should spend a lifetime securing its necessaries: a life spent, however victoriously, in securing the necessaries of life is no more than an elaborate furnishing and decoration of apartments for the reception of a guest who is never to come. Our business here is not to live, but to live happily.

A. E. Housman

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A. E. Housman
Age: 77 †
Born: 1859
Born: January 1
Died: 1936
Died: January 1
Classical Philologist
Classical Scholar
Poet
University Teacher
Writer
Worcs
A. E. Housman
Apartments
Come
Apartment
Securing
Thing
Spent
Elaborate
Good
Lifetime
Decoration
Never
However
Reception
Life
Spend
Victoriously
Existence
Guest
Necessaries
Business
Happily
Furnishing
Live
Guests

More quotes by A. E. Housman

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Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out. Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.
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He would not stay for me, and who can wonder? He would not stay for me to stand and gaze. I shook his hand, and tore my heart in sunder, And went with half my life about my ways.
A. E. Housman
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The bells they sound on Bredon, And still the steeples hum. Come all to church, good people- Oh, noisy bells, be dumb I hear you, I will come.
A. E. Housman
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With rue my heart is laden For golden friends I had, For many a rose-lipped maiden And many a lightfoot lad.
A. E. Housman
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Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose, But young men think it is, and we were young.
A. E. Housman
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All knots that lovers tie Are tied to sever. Here shall your sweetheart lie, Untrue for ever.
A. E. Housman
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Nature, not content with denying him the ability to think, has endowed him with the ability to write.
A. E. Housman
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Loveliest of trees, the cherry now Is hung with bloom along the bough.
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Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill, And while the sun and moon endure Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure, I'd face it as a wise man would, And train for ill and not for good.
A. E. Housman
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On Wenlock Edge the wood's in troubleHis forest fleece the Wrekin heavesThe wind it plies the saplings double, And thick on Severn snow the leaves.
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His folly has not fellow Beneath the blue of day That gives to man or woman His heart and soul away.
A. E. Housman
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Who made the world I cannot tell 'Tis made, and here am I in hell. My hand, though now my knuckles bleed, I never soiled with such a deed.
A. E. Housman
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Some men are more interesting than their books but my book is more interesting than its man.
A. E. Housman
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'Tis spring come out to ramble The hilly brakes around, For under thorn and bramble About the hollow ground The primroses are found. And there's the windflower chilly With all the winds at play, And there's the Lenten lily That has not long to stay And dies on Easter day.
A. E. Housman
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The house of delusions is cheap to build but drafty to live in.
A. E. Housman
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Good religious poetry... is likely to be most justly appreciated and most discriminately relished by the undevout.
A. E. Housman
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I think that to transfuse emotion - not to transmit thought but to set up in the reader's sense a vibration corresponding to what was felt by the writer - is the peculiar function of poetry.
A. E. Housman
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Give me a land of boughs in leaf A land of trees that stand Where trees are fallen there is grief I love no leafless land.
A. E. Housman
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Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill
A. E. Housman
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Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
A. E. Housman