Quote

I have come to see the nonsense of attempting to describe fine scenery. There is no such possibility. If scenery could be adequately reproduced in words, there would have been no need of God's making it in reality.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Nathaniel Hawthorne
Age: 59 †
Born: 1804
Born: July 4
Died: 1864
Died: May 18
Diplomat
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Salem
Massachusetts
Nathaniel Hathorne
Monsieur de l'Aubépine
N. H.
Trying
Possibility
Would
Fine
Words
Reproduced
Making
Adequately
Nature
Scenery
Reality
Attempting
Come
Describe
Need
Nonsense

More quotes by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Image
Insincerity in a man's own heart must make all his enjoyments, all that concerns him, unreal so that his whole life must seem like a merely dramatic representation.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Nothing is more unaccountable than the spell that often lurks in a spoken word. A thought may be present to the mind, and two minds conscious of the same thought, but as long as it remains unspoken their familiar talk flows quietly over the hidden idea.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
When a writer calls his work a Romance, it need hardly be observed that he wishes to claim a certain latitude, both as to its fashion and material, which he would not have felt himself entitled to assume had he professed to be writing a Novel.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Bees are sometimes drowned in the honey which they collectso some writers are lost in their collected learning.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Families are always rising and falling in America.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
This dull river has a deep religion of its own so, let us trust, has the dullest human soul, though, perhaps, unconsciously.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Such has often been my apathy, when objects long sought, and earnestly desired, were placed within my reach.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
By the sympathy of your human hearts for sin ye shall scent out all the places — whether in church, bedchamber, street, field, or forest — where crime has been committed, and shall exult to behold the whole earth one stain of guilt, one mighty blood spot.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Is it a fact-or have I dreamt it-that, by means of electricity, the world of matter has become a great nerve, vibrating thousands of miles in a breathless point of time?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
He had been driven hither by the impulse of that Remorse which dogged him everywhere, and whose own sister and closely linked companion was that Cowardice which invariably drew him back, with her tremulous gripe, just when the other impulse had hurried him to the verge of a disclosure.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
In youth men are apt to write more wisely than they really know or feel and the remainder of life may be not idly spent in realizing and convincing themselves of the wisdom which they uttered long ago.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
The present is burthened too much with the past.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
London is like the grave in one respect -- any man can make himself at home there and whenever a man finds himself homeless elsewhere, he had better either die or go to London.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
There is great incongruity in this idea of monuments, since those to whom they are usually dedicated need no such recognition to embalm their memory and any man who does, is not worthy of one.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
We go all wrong by too strenuous a resolution to go right.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Shall we never never get rid of this Past? ... It lies upon the Present like a giant's dead body.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
We sometimes congratulate ourselves.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Image
Last night, there came a frost, which has done great damage to my garden.... It is sad that Nature will play such tricks on us poor mortals, inviting us with sunny smiles to confide in her, and then, when we are entirely within her power, striking us to the heart.
Nathaniel Hawthorne