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The possession of unlimited power will make a despot of almost any man. There is a possible Nero in the gentlest human creature that walks.

Thomas Bailey Aldrich

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Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Age: 70 †
Born: 1836
Born: November 2
Died: 1907
Died: March 19
Editor
Journalist
Novelist
Poet
Writer
Portsmouth
New Hampshire
Despot
Walks
Nero
Almost
Despots
Possible
Unlimited
Power
Creature
Human
Tyranny
Humans
Possession
Make
Gentlest
Men
Creatures

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What is a day to an immortal soul! A breath, no more.
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But I, in the chilling twilight stand and wait At the portcullis, at thy castle gate, Longing to see the charmed door of dreams Turn on its noiseless hinges, delicate sleep!
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Come watch with me the shaft of fire that glows in yonder West the fair, frail palaces, The fading Alps and archipelagoes and great cloud continents of sunset-seas.
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What is lovely never dies, but passes into other loveliness, Star-dust, or sea-foam, flower or winged air.
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So I sit there kicked my heels, thinking about New Orleans, and watching a morbid blue-bottle fly attempt to commit suicide by butting his head against the windowpane.
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To keep the heart unwrinkled, to be hopeful, kindly, cheerful, reverent that is to triumph over old age.
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What is slang in one age sometimes goes into the vocabulary of the purist in the next.
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I beg you come tonight and dine A welcome waits you and sound wine The Roederer chilly to a charm As Juno's breasts the claret warm.
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The ring of a false coin is not more recognizable than that of a rhyme setting forth a false sorrow.
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Day is a snow-white Dove of heaven That from the East glad message brings. Night is a stealthy, evil Raven, Wrapped to the eyes in his black wings.
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Up from the dark the moon begins to creep and now a pallid, haggard face lifts she above the water-line: thus from the deep a drowned body rises solemnly.
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That was indeed to live -- at one bold swoop to wrest from darkling death the best that death to life can give.
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A glance, a word -- and joy or pain befalls.... How slight the links are in the chain that binds us to our destiny!
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My mind lets go a thousand things, Like dates of wars and deaths of kings
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Gracious to all, to none subservient, Without offense he spoke the word he meant
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No bird has ever uttered note That was not in some first bird's throat Since Eden's freshness and man's fall No rose has been original.
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My father invested his money so securely in the banking business that he was never able to get any of it out again.
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The man who suspects his own tediousness is yet to be born.
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Imagine all human beings swept off the face of the earth, excepting one man. Imagine this man in some vast city, New York or London. Imagine him on the third or fourth day of his solitude sitting in a house and hearing a ring at the door-bell!
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Black Tragedy lets slip her grim disguise and shows you laughing lips and roguish eyes but when, unmasked, gay Comedy appears, how wan her cheeks are, and what heavy tears!
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