Walt Whitman Quotes

The process of reading is not a half sleep, but in the highest sense, an exercise, a gymnast's struggle: that the reader is to do something for him or herself, must be on the alert, just construct indeed the poem, argument, history, metaphysical essay--the text furnishing the hints, the clue, the start, the framework.

I henceforth tread the world, chaste, temperate, an early riser, a steady grower.

Now understand me well. It is provided in the essence of things that from any fruition of success, no matter what, shall come forth something to make a greater struggle necessary.

If the United States haven't grown poets, on any scale of grandeur, it is certain that they import, print, and read more poetry than any equal number of people elsewhere -- probably more than the rest of the world combined. Poetry (like a grand personality) is a growth of many generations -- many rare combinations. To have great poets, there must be great audiences too.

I keep thinking about you every few minutes all day.

An individual is as superb as a nation when he has the qualities which make a superb nation.

I like the scientific spirit-the holding off, the being sure but not too sure, the willingness to surrender ideas when the evidence is against them: this is ultimately fine-it always keeps the way beyond open.

Judging from the main portions of the history of the world, so far, justice is always in jeopardy.

All is procession; the universe is a procession with measured and beautiful motion.

Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth ever afterward resumes its liberty.

Give me such shows - give me the streets of Manhattan!

I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise, Regardless of others, ever regardful of others, Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man, Stuffed with the stuff that is course, and stuffed with the stuff that is fine.

O the joy of the strong-brawn'd fighter, towering in the arena in perfect condition, conscious of power, thirsting to meet his opponent.

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.

O America! Because you build for mankind I build for you.

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear.

I am satisfied ... I see, dance, laugh, sing.

Of all mankind the great poet is the equable man. Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or fail of their sanity.

Love the earth and sun and animals, Despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, Stand up for the stupid and crazy, Devote your income and labor to others... And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

It is only the novice in political economy who thinks it is the duty of government to make its citizens happy - government has no such office.

But where is what I started for so long ago? And why is it yet unfound?

Most works are most beautiful without ornament.

And I or you pocketless of a dime, may purchase the pick of the earth.

I think it is lost.....but nothing is ever lost nor can be lost .

Women sit or move to and fro, some old, some young, / The young are beautiful--but the old are more beautiful than the young.

And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a hero.

Shut not your doors to me proud libraries.

Old age: The estuary that enlarges and spreads itself grandly as it pours into the Great Sea.

The beauty of independence, departure, actions that rely on themselves.

If you done it, it ain't bragging.

Are you the new person drawn toward me?

I sing the body that is electric! I celebrate the Self yet to be unveiled!

Praised be the fathomless universe, for life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious.

This is the city, and I am one of the citizens/Whatever interests the rest interests me

The shallow, as intimated, consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise see in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws.

I and this mystery, here we stand.

The art of art... is simplicity.

Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,Out of the mocking bird's throat, the musical shuttle,. . . .A reminiscence sing.

I heard what was said of the universe, heard it and heard it of several thousand years; it is middling well as far as it goes - but is that all?

The road to wisdom is paved with excess. The mark of a true writer is their ability to mystify the familiar and familiarize the strange.

Peace is always beautiful.

There is that indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius.

Strong and content I travel the open road.

The truest and greatest Poetry, (while subtly and necessarily always rhythmic, and distinguishable easily enough) can never again, in the English language, be express'd in arbitrary and rhyming metre, any more than the greatest eloquence, or the truest power and passion.

The powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.

I am too not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.

The truth is simple. If it was complicated, everyone would understand it.

An electric chain seems to vibrate, as it were, between our brain and him or her preserved there [in a Daguerreotype] so well by the limner's cunning. Time, space, both are annihilated, and we identify the semblance with the reality.

I am large, I contain multitudes

The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.

After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, and so on - have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear - what remains? Nature remains.

Resist much, obey little.

Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed.

Beautiful that war and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly lost.

I think of few heroic actions, which cannot be traced to the artistical impulse. He who does great deeds, does them from his innate sensitiveness to moral beauty.

I give you my hand, I give you my love more precious than money, I give you myself before preaching or law; Will you give me yourself?

Failing to fetch me at first, keep encouraged. Missing me one place, search another. I stop somewhere waiting for you.

Long enough have you dream'd contemptible dreams, Now I wash the gum from your eyes, You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light and of every moment of your life

In the confusion we stay with each other, happy to be together, speaking without uttering a single word.

What stays with you latest and deepest? of curious panics, of hard-fought engagements or sieges tremendous what deepest remains?