Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
What, in the name of common-sense, had I to do with any better society than I had always lived in?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
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.
Always
Lived
Name
Names
Society
Common
Sense
Better
More quotes by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Language,-human language,-after all is but little better than the croak and cackle of fowls, and other utterances of brute nature,-sometimes not so adequate.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
We sometimes congratulate ourselves at the moment of waking from a troubled dream it may be so the moment after death.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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
The love of posterity is the consequence of the necessity of death. If a man were sure of living forever here, he would not care about his offspring.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Keep the imagination sane--that is one of the truest conditions of communion with heaven.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Nobody will use other people's experience, nor have any of his own till it is too late to use it.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
To do nothing is the way to be nothing.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
In an ancient though not very populous settlement, in a retired corner of one of the New England states, arise the walls of a seminary of learning, which, for the convenience of a name, shall be entitled Harley College.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
The inward pleasure of imparting pleasure - that is the choicest of all.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
We must not think too unkindly even of the east wind. It is not, perhaps, a wind to be loved, even in its benignest moods but there are seasons when I delight to feel its breath upon my cheek, though it be never advisable to throw open my bosom and take it into my heart, as I would its gentle sisters of the south and west.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
A screen... the scenery and the figures of life were perfectly represented, but with that bewitching, yet indescribably difference, which always makes a picture, an image, or a shadow, so much more attractive than the original.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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
Sunlight is painting.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Technologies of easy travel give us wings they annihilate the toil and dust of pilgrimage they spiritualize travel! Transition being so facile, what can be any man's inducement to tarry in one spot?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
To the untrue man, the whole universe is false- it is impalpable- it shrinks to nothing within his grasp. And he himself is in so far as he shows himself in a false light, becomes a shadow, or, indeed, ceases to exist.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Now are ye undeceived. Evil is the nature of mankind. Evil must be your only happiness. Welcome again, my children, to the communion of your race.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Dream strange things and make them look like truth.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Just as there comes a warm sunbeam into every cottage window, so comes a lovebeam of God's care and pity for every separate need.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Would all, who cherish such wild wishes, but look around them, they would oftenest find their sphere of duty, of prosperity, and happiness, within those precincts, and in that station where Providence itself has cast their lot. Happy they who read the riddle without a weary world-search, or a lifetime spent in vain!
Nathaniel Hawthorne
My heart was a habitation large enough for many guests, but lonely and chill, and without a household fire. I longed to kindle one! It seemed not so wild a dream.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
