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The material of thought re-acts upon the thought itself.

James Russell Lowell

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James Russell Lowell
Age: 72 †
Born: 1819
Born: February 22
Died: 1891
Died: August 12
Diplomat
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Poet
Writer
Cambridge
Massachusetts
Materials
Upon
Thought
Acts
Material

More quotes by James Russell Lowell

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It is only the intellect that can be thoroughly and hideously wicked. It can forget everything in the attainment of its ends. The heart recoils in its retired some drops of childhood's dew still linger, defying manhood's fiery noon.
James Russell Lowell
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The fireflies o'er the meadow In pulses come and go.
James Russell Lowell
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Where Church and State are habitually associated, it is natural that minds, even of a high order, should unconsciously come to regard religion as only a subtler mode of police.
James Russell Lowell
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There are two kinds of genius. The first and highest may be said to speak out of the eternal to the present, and must compel its age to understand it the second understands its age, and tells it what it wishes to be told.
James Russell Lowell
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They are slaves who fear to speak, for the fallen and the weak.
James Russell Lowell
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God is not dumb, that he should speak no more If thou hast wanderings in the wilderness And find'st not Sinai, 'tis thy soul is poor.
James Russell Lowell
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They talk about their Pilgrim blood, their birthright high and holy! a mountain-stream that ends in mud thinks is melancholy.
James Russell Lowell
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The time is ripe, and rotten-ripe, for change.
James Russell Lowell
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No price is set on the lavish summer June may be had by the poorest comer.
James Russell Lowell
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Reading Chaucer is like brushing through the dewy grass at sunrise.
James Russell Lowell
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The one thing finished in this hasty world.
James Russell Lowell
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Fate loves best such syllables as are sweet and sonorous on the tongue.
James Russell Lowell
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History is clarified experience.
James Russell Lowell
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Those who know the truth are not equal to those who love it Confucius All truth is safe and nothing else is safe, but he who keeps back truth, or withholds it from men, from motives of expediency, is either a coward or a criminal.
James Russell Lowell
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In the scale of the destinies, brawn will never weigh so mach as brain.
James Russell Lowell
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Communism means barbarism.
James Russell Lowell
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The future works out great men's destinies The present is enough for common souls, Who, never looking forward, are indeed Mere clay wherein the footprints of their age Are petrified forever.
James Russell Lowell
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The quiet tenderness of Chaucer, where you almost seem to hear the hot tears falling, and the simple choking words sobbed out.
James Russell Lowell
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Some day the soft Ideal that we wooed confronts us fiercely, foe-beset, pursued, and cries reproachful: Was it then my praise, and not myself was loved? Prove now thy truth I claim of thee the promise of thy youth.
James Russell Lowell
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Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes, - they were souls that stood alone, While the men they agonized for hurled the contumelious stone, Stood serene, and down the future saw the golden beam incline To the side of perfect justice, mastered by their faith divine, By one man's plain truth to manhood and to God's supreme design.
James Russell Lowell