T. S. Eliot Quotes
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That is the worst moment, when you feel you have lost / The desires for all that was most desirable, / Before you are contented with what you can desire; / Before you know what is left to be desired; / And you go on wishing that you could desire / What desire has left behind.
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When the gods know that a god hath fallen, With this kindly feeling They do encourage him-- Be thou a god again and again.
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Any religion is forever in danger of petrifaction into mere ritual and habit, though ritual and habit be essential to religion.
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As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved in her laughter and being part of it, until her teeth were only accidental stars with a talent for squad-drill.
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Dear Mother, I am getting on nicely in my work at the bank, and like it ... I want to find out something about the science of money while I am at it; it is an extraordinarily interesting subject.
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They don't understand what it is to be awake, / To be living on several planes at once / Though one cannot speak with several voices at once.
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No place of grace for those who avoid the Face. No time to rejoice for those who walk among noise and deny the Voice.
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Fading, fading: strength beyond hope and despair climbing the third stair. Lord, I am not worthy Lord, I am not worthy but speak the word only.
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Whatever you think, be sure it is what you think; whatever you want, be sure that is what you want; whatever you feel, be sure that is what you feel.
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Not only every great poet, but every genuine, but lesser poet, fulfils once for all some possibility of language, and so leaves one possibility less for his successors.
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The dripping blood our only drink, The bloody flesh our only food: In spite of which we like to think That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.
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A philosophy can and must be worked out with the greatest rigour and discipline in the details, but can ultimately be founded on nothing but faith: and this is the reason, I suspect, why the novelties in philosophy are only in elaboration, and never in fundamentals.
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I do not approve the extermination of the enemy; the policy of exterminating or, as it is barbarously said, liquidating enemies, is one of the most alarming developments of modern war and peace, from the point of view of those who desire the survival
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At the violet hour, when the eyes and back Turn upward from the desk, when the human engine waits Like a taxi throbbing waiting I Tiresias, though blind, throbbing between two lives.
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But at my back from time to time I hear The sound of horns and motors, which shall bring Sweeney to Mrs. Porter in the spring. O the moon shone bright on Mrs. Porter And on her daughter They wash their feet in soda water.
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With a poem you can say 'I got my feeling into words for myself. I now have the equivalent in words for that much of what I have felt.'
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A prose that is altogether alive demands something of the reader that the ordinary novel reader is not prepared to give.
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Cats must have three names-an everyday name, such as Peter; a more particular, dignified name, such as Quaxo, Bombalurina, or Jellylorum; and, thirdly, the name the cat thinks up for himself, his deep and inscrutable singular Name.
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After such knowledge, what forgiveness? Think now History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors And issues, deceives with whispering ambitions Guides us by vanities.
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Upon the glazen shelves kept watch Matthew and Waldo, guardians of the faith The army of unalterable law.
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All art emulates the condition of ritual. That is what it comes from and to that it must always return for nourishment.
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Humility is the most difficult of all virtues to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of self.
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The only wisdom we can hope to acquire Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless. The houses are all gone under the sea. The dancers are all gone under the hill.
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Words move, music moves Only in time; but that which is only living Can only die. Words, after speech, reach Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern, Can words or music reach The stillness.