Top 50 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Quotes

Lives of great men all remind us, we can make our lives sublime, and, departing, leave behind us, footprints on the sands of time.

Resolve and thou art free.

Like a French poem is life; being only perfect in structure when with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.

They who go Feel not the pain of parting; it is they Who stay behind that suffer.

Whoever benefits his enemy with straightforward intention that man’s enemies will soon fold their hands in devotion.

Let us, then, be up and doing, with a heart for any fate; still achieving, still pursuing, learn to labor and to wait.

Look not mournfully into the past, it comes not back again. Wisely improve the present, it is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future without fear and with a manly heart.

Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing, only a signal shown, and a distant voice in the darkness; So on the ocean of life, we pass and speak one another, only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.

In character, in manner, in style, in all things, the supreme excellence is simplicity.

The mind of the scholar, if he would leave it large and liberal, should come in contact with other minds.

Love keeps the cold out better than a cloak.

For age is opportunity no less Than youth itself, though in another dress, And as the evening twilight fades away The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.

If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it.

The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night.

Build today, then strong and sure, With a firm and ample base; And ascending and secure. Shall tomorrow find its place.

There is no grief like the grief that does not speak.

Fame comes only when deserved, and then is as inevitable as destiny, for it is destiny.

He that respects himself is safe from others. He wears a coat of mail that none can pierce.

Each morning sees some task begun, each evening sees it close; Something attempted, something done, has earned a night’s repose.

Whenever nature leaves a hole in a person’s mind, she generally plasters it over with a thick coat of self-conceit.

Music is the universal language of mankind.

For his heart was in his work, and the heart giveth grace unto every art.

Method is more important than strength, when you wish to control your enemies. By dropping golden beads near a snake, a crow once managed To have a passer-by kill the snake for the beads.

Man is always more than he can know of himself; consequently, his accomplishments, time and again, will come as a surprise to him.

Thought takes man out of servitude, into freedom.

Youth comes but once in a lifetime.

Perseverance is a great element of success. If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody.

The greatest firmness is the greatest mercy.

Talk not of wasted affection – affection never was wasted.

All things come round to him who will but wait.

The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.

For his heart was in his work, and the heart giveth grace unto every art.

However things may seem, no evil thing is success and no good thing is failure.

The nearer the dawn the darker the night.

The dawn is not distant, nor is the night starless; love is eternal.

If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody.

Intelligence and courtesy not always are combined; Often in a wooden house a golden room we find.

The human voice is the organ of the soul.

A single conversation across the table with a wise man is better than ten years mere study of books.

Into each life some rain must fall.

Love gives itself; it is not bought.

It is a beautiful trait in the lover’s character, that they think no evil of the object loved.

Thy fate is the common fate of all; Into each life some rain must fall.

Men of genius are often dull and inert in society; as the blazing meteor, when it descends to earth, is only a stone.

People demand freedom only when they have no power.

Something attempted, something done, Has earned a nights repose.

Evil is only good perverted.

All things must change to something new, to something strange.

A torn jacket is soon mended; but hard words bruise the heart of a child.

As to the pure mind all things are pure, so to the poetic mind all things are poetical.