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Since the printing press came into being, poetry has ceased to be the delight of the whole community of man it has become the amusement and delight of the few.

John Masefield

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John Masefield
Age: 88 †
Born: 1878
Born: June 1
Died: 1967
Died: May 12
Journalist
Novelist
Poet
Writer
County of Herefordshire
John Edward Masefield
Community
Printing
Become
Amusement
Whole
Presses
Men
Press
Delight
Poetry
Since
Came
Ceased

More quotes by John Masefield

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O lovely lily clean, O lily springing green, O lily bursting white, Dear lily of delight, Spring in my heart agen That I may flower to men.
John Masefield
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Man cannot call the brimming instant back Time's an affair of instants spun to days If man must make an instant gold, or black, Let him, he may but Time must go his ways. Life may be duller for an instant's blaze. Life's an affair of instants spun to years, Instants are only cause of all these tears.
John Masefield
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Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.
John Masefield
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The distant soul can shake the distant friend's soul and make the longing felt, over untold miles.
John Masefield
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So death obscures your gentle form, So memory strives to make the darkness bright And, in that heap of rocks, your body lies, Part of the island till the planet ends, My gentle comrade, beautiful and wise, Part of this crag this bitter surge offends, While I, who pass, a little obscure thing, War with this force, and breathe, and am its king.
John Masefield
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The Lord who gave us Earth and Heaven Takes that as thanks for all He's given. The book he lent is given back All blotted red and smutted black.
John Masefield
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When Life knocks at the door no one can wait, When Death makes his arrest we have to go.
John Masefield
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From '41 to '51I was my folk's contrary sonI bit my father's hand right throughAnd broke my mother's heart in two.
John Masefield
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State are not made, nor patched they grow Grow slow through centuries of pain, And grow correctly in the main But only grow by certain laws, Of certain bits in certain jaws.
John Masefield
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When the last sea is sailed and last shallow charted, When the last field is reaped and the last harvest stored, When the last fire is out and the last guest departed Grant the last prayer that I pray, Be good to me, O Lord.
John Masefield
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All I ask is a tall ship and a star to sail her by.
John Masefield
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Love is a flame to burn out human wills, Love is a flame to set the will on fire, Love is a flame to cheat men into mire.
John Masefield
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Off Cape Horn there are but two kinds of weather, neither one of them a pleasant kind.
John Masefield
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God dropped a spark down into everyone, And if we find and fan it to a blaze, It'll spring up and glow, like--like the sun, And light the wandering out of stony ways.
John Masefield
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Death opens unknown doors. It is most grand to die.
John Masefield
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I hold that when a person dies / His soul returns again to earth / Arrayed in some new flesh disguise / Another mother gives him birth / With sturdier limbs and brighter brain.
John Masefield
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The days that make us happy make us wise
John Masefield
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All the great things of life are swiftly done, Creation, death, and love the double gate. However much we dawdle in the sun We have to hurry at the touch of Fate.
John Masefield
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I have seen dawn and sunset on moors and windy hills Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain.
John Masefield
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Commonplace people dislike tragedy because they dare not suffer and cannot exult.
John Masefield