"Are you the new person drawn toward me? To begin with, take warning - I am surely far different from what you suppose; Do you suppose you will find in me your ideal? Do you think it so easy to have me become your lover? Do you think the friendship of me would be unalloy'd satisfaction? Do you think I am trusty and faithful? Do you see no further than this façade—this smooth and tolerant manner of me? Do you suppose yourself advancing on real ground toward a real heroic man? Have you no thought, O dreamer, that it may be all maya, illusion?"
Quote collection
Walt Whitman quotes (page 2 of 25)
494 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Afoot and lighthearted I take to the open road, healthy, free, the world before me."
"Every moment of light and dark is a miracle."
"O captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done. The ship has weather'd every wrack The prize we sought is won The port is near, the bells I hear The people all exulting While follow eyes, the steady keel The vessel grim and daring But Heart! Heart! Heart! O the bleeding drops of red Where on the deck my captain lies Fallen cold and dead."
"Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes."
"Whatever satisfies the soul is truth."
"Did you, too, O friend, suppose democracy was only for elections, for politics, and for a party name? I say democracy is only of use there that it may pass on and come to its flower and fruit in manners, in the highest forms of interaction between people, and their beliefs - in religion, literature, colleges and schools- democracy in all public and private life."
"The gift is to the giver, and comes back most to him - it cannot fail"
"Wisdom is not finally tested by the schools, Wisdom cannot be pass'd from one having it to another not having it, Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof."
"In the dooryard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash'd palings, Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shaped leaves of rich green, with many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love, With every leaf a miracle - and from this bush in the dooryard, With delicate-color'd blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green, A sprig with its flower I break."
"A writer can do nothing for men more necessary, satisfying, than just simply to reveal to them the infinite possibility of their own souls."
"Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, When I give I give myself."
"A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books."
"To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle. Every cubic inch of space is a miracle."
"The secret of it all, is to write in the gush, the throb, the flood, of the moment – to put things down without deliberation – without worrying about their style – without waiting for a fit time or place. I always worked that way. I took the first scrap of paper, the first doorstep, the first desk, and wrote – wrote, wrote…By writing at the instant the very heartbeat of life is caught."
"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."
"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?"
"I celebrate myself, and sing myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you."
"Now, Voyager, sail thou forth, to seek and find.""
"Resist much, obey little."