I have laughed, in bitterness and agony of heart, at the contrast between what I seem and what I am!
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNEAll brave men love; for he only is brave who has affections to fight for, whether in the daily battle of life, or in physical contests.
More Nathaniel Hawthorne Quotes
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At no time are people so sedulously careful to keep their trifling appointments, attend to their ordinary occupations, and thus put a commonplace aspect on life, as when conscious of some secret that if suspected would make them look monstrous in the general eye.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
When scattered clouds are resting on the bosoms of hills, it seems as if one might climb into the heavenly region, earth being so intermixed with sky, and gradually transformed into it.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Trusting no man as his friend, he could not recognize his enemy when the latter actually appeared.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
The trees reflected in the river – they are unconscious of a spiritual world so near to them. So are we.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Generosity is the flower of justice.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Articulate words are a harsh clamor and dissonance. When man arrives at his highest perfection, he will again be dumb.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Echo is the voice of a reflection in a mirror.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Words – so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Mankind are earthen jugs with spirits in them.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Let men tremble to win the hand of woman, unless they win along with it the utmost passion of her heart!
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
And there I sat, long long ago, waiting for the world to know me.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Dream strange things and make them look like truth.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
What we need for our happiness is often close at hand, if we knew but how to seek for it.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
I find nothing so singular to life as that everything appears to lose its substance the instant one actually grapples with it.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
The inward pleasure of imparting pleasure – that is the choicest of all.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
There is an alchemy of quiet malice by which women can concoct a subtle poison from ordinary trifles.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
The thing you set your mind on is the thing you ultimately become.
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 -
I want nothing to do with politicians. Their hearts wither away, and die out of their bodies. Their consciences are turned to india-rubber, or to some substance as black as that, and which will stretch as much.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
This world owes all its forward impulses to people ill at ease.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
All brave men love; for he only is brave who has affections to fight for, whether in the daily battle of life, or in physical contests.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
To do nothing is the way to be nothing.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
There is evil in every human heart, which may remain latent, perhaps, through the whole of life; but circumstances may rouse it to activity.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
My fortune somewhat resembled that of a person who should entertain an idea of committing suicide, and, altogether beyond his hopes, meet with the good hap to be murdered.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE -
Ugliness without tact is horrible.
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