Walt Whitman

“We convince by our presence.”

“Resist much, obey little.”

“The future is no more uncertain than the present.”

“Copulation is no more foul to me than death is.”

“Song of Myself”

“Keep your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you.”

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.”

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

“What is that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.”

“Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.”

“Keep your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you.”

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.”

“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.”

“Simplicity is the glory of expression.”

“Re-examine all you have been told. Dismiss what insults your soul.”

“I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don't believe I deserved my friends.”

“Oh while I live, to be the ruler of life, not a slave, to meet life as a powerful conqueror, and nothing exterior to me will ever take command of me.”

“A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.”

“I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.”

“Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.”

“Every moment of light and dark is a miracle.”

“We convince by our presence.”

“The genius of the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges, or churches, or parlors, nor even in its newspapers or inventors, but always most in the common people.”

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

“I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,”

“If any thing is sacred, the human body is sacred.”

“Viewed freely, the English language is the accretion and growth of every dialect, race, and range of time, and is both the free and compacted composition of all.”

“Oh while I live, to be the ruler of life, not a slave, to meet life as a powerful conqueror, and nothing exterior to me will ever take command of me.”

“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.”

“All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor.”

“Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, When I give I give myself.”

“I cannot be awake for nothing looks to me as it did before, Or else I am awake for the first time, and all before has been a mean sleep.”

“Nothing can happen more beautiful than death.”

“Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.”

“The real war will never get in the books.”

“Here or henceforward it is all the same to me, I accept Time absolutely.”

“I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,”

“And I will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than death.”

“Produce great men, the rest follows.”

“Produce great men, the rest follows.”

“Now I see the secret of making the best person: it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.”

“Whoever degrades another degrades me, And whatever is done or said returns at last to me.”

“Sometimes with one I love, I fill myself with rage, for fear I effuse unreturn'd love;”

“The shallow consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise man sees in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws.”

“O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you, you express me better than I can express myself.”

“A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;”

“The whole theory of the universe is directed unerringly to one single individual.”

“Be curious, not judgmental.”

“I have learned that to be with those I like is enough.”

“To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.”

“There is no week nor day nor hour when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their roughness and spirit of defiance.”

“Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes.”

“Re-examine all that you have been told... dismiss that which insults your soul.”

“I celebrate myself, and sing myself.”

“Why are there trees I never walk under but large and melodious thoughts descend upon me?”

“The future is no more uncertain than the present.”

“I have learned that to be with those I like is enough.”

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

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

“I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.”

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

“I exist as I am, that is enough.”

“To have great poets, there must be great audiences.”

“Produce great men, the rest follows.”

“Freedom - to walk free and own no superior.”

“And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud.”

“To have great poets, there must be great audiences.”

“The genius of the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges, or churches, or parlors, nor even in its newspapers or inventors, but always most in the common people.”

“Have you learned the lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons from those who braced themselves against you, and disputed passage with you?”

“And your very flesh shall be a great poem.”

“I accept reality and dare not question it.”

“Note, to-day, an instructive, curious spectacle and conflict. Science, (twin, in its fields, of Democracy in its)—Science, testing absolutely all thoughts, all works, has already burst well upon the world—a sun, mounting, most illuminating, most glorious—surely never again to set. But against it, deeply entrench'd, holding possession, yet remains, (not only through the churches and schools, but by imaginative literature, and unregenerate poetry,) the fossil theology of the mythic-materialistic, superstitious, untaught and credulous, fable-loving, primitive ages of humanity.”

“Nothing endures but personal qualities.”

“I celebrate myself, and sing myself.”

“Song of myself”

“To die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.”

“The great city is that which has the greatest man or woman: if it be a few ragged huts, it is still the greatest city in the whole world.”

“The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book.”

“Have you heard that it was good to gain the day? I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.”

“Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune.”

“When I give I give myself.”

“I say to mankind, Be not curious about God. For I, who am curious about each, am not curious about God - I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least.”

“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?”

“I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don't believe I deserved my friends.”

“Have you heard that it was good to gain the day? I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.”

“Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me? And why should I not speak to you?”

“Let that which stood in front go behind, let that which was behind advance to the front, let bigots, fools, unclean persons, offer new propositions, let the old propositions be postponed.”

“He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher.”

“I act as the tongue of you,”

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

“A great city is that which has the greatest men and women.”

“-->”

“To the real artist in humanity, what are called bad manners are often the most picturesque and significant of all.”

“There is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe.”

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

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

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

“In our sun-down perambulations, of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing "base", a certain game of ball ... Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our close rooms ... the game of ball is glorious.”

“Why are there trees I never walk under but large and melodious thoughts descend upon me?”

“We Americans have yet to really learn our own antecedents, and sort them, to unify them. They will be found ampler than has been supposed, and in widely different sources. Thus far, impress'd by New England writers and schoolmasters, we tacitly abandon ourselves to the notion that our United States has been fashion'd from the British Islands only, and essentially form a second England only — which is a very great mistake.”

“Speech is the twin of my vision, it is unequal to measure itself, it provokes me forever, it says sarcastically, Walt you contain enough, why don't you let it out then?”

“Some people are so much sunlight to the square inch. I am still bathing in the cheer he radiated.”

“The words of my book nothing, the drift of it everything.”

“I find I'm a good deal more of a socialist than I thought I was: maybe not technically, politically, so, but intrinsically, in my meanings.”

“I say that democracy can never prove itself beyond cavil, until it founds and luxuriantly grows its own forms of art, poems, schools, theology, displacing all that exists, or that has been produced anywhere in the past, under opposite influences.”

“I said: "Baseball is the hurrah game of the republic!" He was hilarious: "That's beautiful: the hurrah game! well — it's our game: that's the chief fact in connection with it: America's game: has the snap, go fling, of the American atmosphere — belongs as much to our institutions, fits into them as significantly, as our constitutions, laws: is just as important in the sum total of our historic life."”

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

“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. To have great poets, there must be great audiences too.”

“The beautiful uncut hair of graves.”

“I will write the evangel-poem of comrades and of love.”

“The proof of a poet is that his country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it.”

“I say the real and permanent grandeur of these States must be their religion.”

“The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.”

“I say the whole earth and all the stars in the sky are for religion’s sake.”

“O the joy of my spirit--it is uncaged--it darts like lightning!”

“I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.”

“None has begun to think how divine he himself is and how certain the future is.”

“Other lands have their vitality in a few, a class, but we have it in the bulk of our people.”

“Nothing can happen more beautiful than death.”

“I loafe and invite my soul.”

“I have no mockings or arguments; I witness and wait.”

“In the faces of men and women I see God.”

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.”

“I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”

“I see Hermes, unsuspected, dying, well-beloved, saying to the people, "Do not weep for me,I return to the celestial sphere where every one goes in his turn."”

“Freedom - to walk free and own no superior.”

“Each of us inevitable;Each of us limitless—each of us with his or her right upon the earth.”

“The great city is that which has the greatest man or woman.”

“In this broad earth of ours,Nestles the seed perfection.”

“Here the frailest leaves of me and yet my strongest lasting, Here I shade and hide my thoughts, I myself do not expose them, And yet they expose me more than all my other poems”

“All, all for immortality,Love like the light silently wrapping all.”

“Youth, large, lusty, loving—Youth, full of grace, force, fascination!Do you know that Old Age may come after you, with equal grace, force, fascination?”

“Roaming in thought over the Universe, I saw the little that is Good steadily hastening towards immortality,And the vast that is evil I saw hastening to merge itself and become lost and dead.”

“Thunder on! Stride on! Democracy. Strike with vengeful stroke!”

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.”

“O Banner!May they stand fast then? Not an hour, unless you, above them and all, stand fast.”

“Peace is always beautiful.”

“Over all the sky—the sky! far, far out of reach, studded with the eternal stars.”

“Give me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling!”

“Lo! the moon ascending!Immense and silent moon.”

“Beautiful that war and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly lost;That the hands of the sisters Death and Night incessantly softly wash again and ever again, this soiled world.”

“When lilacs last in the door-yard bloomed,I mourned, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.”

“Come lovely and soothing death,Sooner or later, delicate death.”

“Praised be the fathomless universeFor the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death.”

“O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done!The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting.”

“Liberty is to be subserved, whatever occurs.”

“Peace is always beautiful.”

“What do you suppose will satisfy the soul except to walk free and own no superior?”

“To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.”

“I was thinking the day most splendid, till I saw what the not-day exhibited;I was thinking this globe enough, till there sprang out so noiseless around me myriads of other globes.”

“The future is no more uncertain than the present.”

“I see that I am to wait for what will be exhibited by death.”

“What do you think has become of the young and old men?”

“I swear I think there is nothing but immortality!”

“The paths to the house I seek to make,But leave to those to come the house itself.”

“Society waits unformed and is between things ended and things begun.”

“Now obey thy cherished secret wish,Depart upon thy endless cruise, old Sailor!”

“I announce the great individual, fluid as Nature, chaste, affectionate, compassionate, fully armed;And I announce an end that shall lightly and joyfully meet its translation.”

“And your very flesh shall be a great poem.”

“I discover myself on the verge of a usual mistake.”

“I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love”

“I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don't believe I deserved my friends.”

“For we cannot tarry here,”

“Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road.”

“Have you learned the lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons from those who braced themselves against you, and disputed passage with you?”

“Every moment of light and dark is a miracle.”

“I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.”

“re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.”

“Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,”

“Pointing to another world will never stop vice among us; shedding light over this world can alone help us.”

“I believe in the flesh and the appetites;”

“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.”

“Keep your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you.”

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

“Nothing endures but personal qualities.”

“poor boy! I never knew you, Yet I think I could not refuse this moment to die for you, if that would save you”

“The press of my foot to the earth springs a hundred affections,”

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

“I am larger, better than I thought; I did not know I held so much goodness.”