Quote

Laziness acknowledges the relation of the present to the past but ignores its relation to the future impatience acknowledge its relation to the future but ignores its relation to the past neither the lazy nor the impatient man, that is, accepts the present instant in its full reality and so cannot love his neighbour completely.

W. H. Auden

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

W. H. Auden
Age: 66 †
Born: 1907
Born: February 21
Died: 1973
Died: September 28
Author
Composer
Essayist
Librettist
Literary Critic
Literary Historian
Playwright
Poet
Screenwriter
University Teacher
Writer
Jórvík
Wystan Hugh Auden
Wystan Auden
Wystan H Auden
W. H. Wystan Hugh Auden
Love
Accepting
Impatient
Present
Laziness
Full
Lazy
Future
Acknowledge
Acknowledges
Reality
Instant
Ignores
Cannot
Relation
Accepts
Past
Neither
Impatience
Men
Completely
Neighbour

More quotes by W. H. Auden

Image
Now the leaves are falling fast, Nurse's flowers will not last Nurses to their graves are gone, And the prams go rolling on.
W. H. Auden
Image
I think the first prerequisite to civilization is an ability to make polite conversation.
W. H. Auden
Image
Now is the age of anxiety.
W. H. Auden
Image
A writer is a maker, not a man of action: his private life is of no concern to anybody but himself, his family and his friends.
W. H. Auden
Image
Get up very early and get going at once. In fact, work first and wash afterwards.
W. H. Auden
Image
May it not be that, just as we have to have faith in Him, God has to have faith in us and, considering the history of the human race so far, may it not be that 'faith' is even more difficult for Him than it is for us?
W. H. Auden
Image
My deepest feeling about politicians is that they are dangerous lunatics to be avoided when possible and carefully humored people, above all, to whom one must never tell the truth.
W. H. Auden
Image
Human language is mythological and metaphorical by nature.
W. H. Auden
Image
The chances are that, in the course of his lifetime, the major poet will write more bad poems than the minor, simply because major poets write a lot.
W. H. Auden
Image
Learn from your dreams what you lack.
W. H. Auden
Image
To be free is often to be lonely.
W. H. Auden
Image
I'll love you till the ocean Is folded and hung up to dry And the seven stars go squawking Like geese about the sky.
W. H. Auden
Image
Slavery is so intolerable a condition that the slave can hardly escape deluding himself into thinking that he is choosing to obey his master's commands when, in fact, he is obliged to. Most slaves of habit suffer from this delusion and so do some writers, enslaved by an all too personal style.
W. H. Auden
Image
The windiest militant trash Important Persons shout Is not so crude as our wish: What mad Nijinsky wrote About Diaghilev Is true of the normal heart For the error bred in the bone Of each woman and each man Craves what it cannot have Not universal love But to be loved alone.
W. H. Auden
Image
Sob, heavy world Sob as you spin, Mantled in mist Remote from the happy.
W. H. Auden
Image
All poets adore explosions, thunderstorms, tornadoes, conflagrations, ruins, scenes of spectacular carnage. The poetic imagination is not at all a desirable quality in a statesman.
W. H. Auden
Image
Intellectual disgrace Stares from every human face, And the seas of pity lie Locked and frozen in each eye.
W. H. Auden
Image
A professor is someone who talks in someone else's sleep.
W. H. Auden
Image
Those who will not reason, perish in the act. Those who will not act, perish for that reason.
W. H. Auden
Image
The center that I cannot find is known to my unconscious mind.
W. H. Auden