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What holy cities are to nomadic tribes — a symbol of race and a bond of union — great books are to the wandering souls of men: they are the Meccas of the mind.

George Edward Woodberry

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George Edward Woodberry
Age: 74 †
Born: 1855
Born: May 12
Died: 1930
Died: January 2
Biographer
Journalist
Literary Critic
Poet
Writer
the United States of America
George E. Woodberry
Race
Wander
Soul
Symbols
Book
Union
Nomadic
Great
Unions
Mecca
Mind
Souls
Wandering
Men
Holy
Tribes
Cities
Symbol
Books
Bond

More quotes by George Edward Woodberry

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You may name a bronze statue 'Liberty,' or a painted figure in a city hall 'Commerce,' or a marble form in a temple 'Athene' or 'Venus' but what is really there is only a representation of a single woman.
George Edward Woodberry
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We foresee no limit to scientific advancement in the future, and in scientific truth there is nothing dead science is always a living and growing body of knowledge but art on the contrary has many times run its course to an end, and exhausted its vital power.
George Edward Woodberry
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Who of English speech, bred to the traditions of his race, does not recognize Hamlet in his 'inky cloak' at a glance? Not to know him would argue one's self untaught in the chief glories of his language.
George Edward Woodberry
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To realize life in the abstract as noble or beautiful or humane, to set it forth so with radiance upon it, that is civilization in the arts. Shakespeare is the chief modern example of this supreme faculty of mankind.
George Edward Woodberry
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A marvellous power of expression over language often distinguishes genius but Shakespeare in his phrases seems independent of the bonds of language as of the bonds of metre.
George Edward Woodberry
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The growth of art seems to be in cycles, and often its vigorous lifetime is restricted to a century or two. The periods of distinctive drama, Greek, English, Spanish, fall within such a limit the schools of painting and sculpture likewise and, in poetry, the Victorian age or the school of Pope will serve as examples.
George Edward Woodberry
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If you can't have faith in what is held up to you for faith, you must find things to believe in yourself, for a life without faith in something is too narrow a space to live.
George Edward Woodberry
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Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.
George Edward Woodberry
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What faith in man must in our new world beat, Thinking how once he saw before his face The west and all the host of stars retreat Into the silent infinite of space!
George Edward Woodberry
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It is not meant that the artist, in arriving at truth, must follow the way of the scientist, or, in stating it, the way of the philosopher.
George Edward Woodberry
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The willingness to take risks is our grasp of faith.
George Edward Woodberry
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Genius is that in which the soul of a race bums at its brightest, revealing and preserving its vision works of art are great and significant in proportion to the clarity and fulness with which they incarnate this vision.
George Edward Woodberry
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Art does not, like science, set forth a permanent order of nature, the enduring skeleton of law. Two factors primarily determine its works: one is the idea in the mind of the artist, the other is his power of expression and both these factors are extremely variable.
George Edward Woodberry
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My first recollection of hearing Wendell Phillips is from my college days, though of course he was always one of my heroes, and I may have heard him before, for we were an anti-slavery family.
George Edward Woodberry
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Always begin anew with the day, just as nature does. It is one of the sensible things that nature does.
George Edward Woodberry
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Thrashing is not the most noticeably awful of disappointments. Not to have attempted is the genuine disappointment.
George Edward Woodberry
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The poet craves emotion, and feeds the fire that consumes him, and only under this condition is he baptized with creative power.
George Edward Woodberry
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Old times never come back and I suppose it's just as well. What comes back is a new morning every day in the year, and that's better.
George Edward Woodberry
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Education has really only one basic factor: one must want it.
George Edward Woodberry
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The Greeks, those originators of the intellectual life, fixed for us the idea of the poet. He was a divine man more sacred than the priest, who was at best an intermediary between men and the gods, but in the poet the god was present and spoke.
George Edward Woodberry