William Butler Yeats Great Quotations

Because of that great nobleness of hersThe fire that stirs about her, when she stirs,Burns but more clearly.

Out of Ireland have we come. Great hatred, little room, Maimed us at the start.

We . . . are no petty people. We are of the great stocks of Europe. We are the people of Burke; we are the people of Swift, the people of Emmet, the people of Parnell. We have created most of the modern literature of this country. We have created the best of its political intelligence.

It would need a great deal of wisdom to know what it is we want to know.

When such as I cast out remorseSo great a sweetness flows into the breastWe must laugh and we must sing,We are blest by everything,Everything we look upon is blest.

I bear a burden that might well tryMen that do all by rule,And what can IThat am a wandering-witted foolBut pray to God that He easeMy great responsibilities?

The years like great black oxen tread the world, and God the herdsman treads them on behind, and I am broken by their passing feet.

Half close your eyelids, loosen your hair,And dream about the great and their pride;They have spoken against you everywhere,But weigh this song with the great and their pride;I made it out of a mouthful of air,Their children's children shall say they have lied.

A mouth that has no moisture and no breath Breathless mouths may summon; I hail the superhuman; I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.