William Cullen Bryant Quotes
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Pleasantly, between the pelting showers, the sunshine gushes down.
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A stable, changeless state, 'twere cause indeed to weep.
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Or, bide thou where the poppy blows With windflowers fail and fair.
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The air was fragrant with a thousand trodden aromatic herbs, with fields of lavender, and with the brightest roses blushing in tufts all over the meadows.
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Father, thy hand Hath reared these venerable columns, thou Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun, Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze, And shot towards heaven.
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Fairest of all that earth beholds, the hues That live among the clouds, and flush the air, Lingering, and deepening at the hour of dews.
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On rolls the stream with a perpetual sigh; The rocks moan wildly as it passes by; Hyssop and wormwood border all the strand, And not a flower adorns the dreary land.
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Difficulty is the nurse of greatness.
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The groves were God's first temples.
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That make the meadows green; and, poured round all, Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste,-- Are but the solemn decorations all Of the great tomb of man.
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Lay down the axe; fling by the spade; Leave in its track the toiling plough; The rifle and the bayonet-blade For arms like yours were fitter now; And let the hands that ply the pen Quit the light task, and learn to wield The horseman's crooked brand, and rein The charger on the battle-field.
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Go forth under the open sky, and list To Nature's teachings.
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Thou who wouldst see the lovely and the wild Mingled in harmony on Nature's face, Ascend our rocky mountains. Let thy foot Fail not with weariness, for on their tops The beauty and the majesty of earth, Spread wide beneath, shall make thee to forget The steep and toilsome way.
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The stormy March has come at last, With winds and clouds and changing skies; I hear the rushing of the blast That through the snowy valley flies.
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The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods and meadows brown and sear.
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And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief.
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There is a day of sunny rest For every dark and troubled night; And grief may hide an evening guest, But joy shall come with early light.
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On my cornice linger the ripe black grapes ungathered; Children fill the groves with the echoes of their glee, Gathering tawny chestnuts, and shouting when beside them Drops the heavy fruit of the tall black-walnut tree.
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Truth crushed to earth shall rise again,- The eternal years of God are hers; But Error, wounded, writhes with pain, And dies among his worshippers.
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The summer morn is bright and fresh, the birds are darting by. As if they loved to breast the breeze that sweeps the cool clear sky.
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Oh, Constellations of the early night That sparkled brighter as the twilight died, And made the darkness glorious! I have seen Your rays grow dim upon the horizon's edge And sink behind the mountains. I have seen The great Orion, with his jewelled belt, That large-limbed warrior of the skies, go down Into the gloom. Beside him sank a crowd Of shining ones.
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Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again, And, lost each human trace, surrendering up Thine individual being, shalt thou go To mix forever with the elements, To be a brother to the insensible rock And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mold.
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God hath yoked to guilt her pale tormentor,--misery.
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Ah, why Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore Only among the crowd and under roofs That our frail hands have raised?