John Greenleaf Whittier Quotations

The low green tent Whose curtain never outward swings.

O brother man! fold to thy heart thy brother; Where pity dwells, the peace of God is there; To worship rightly is to love each other, Each smile a hymn, each kindly deed a prayer.

The sun that brief December day Rose cheerless over hills of gray, And, darkly circled, gave at noon A sadder light than waning moon.

The green earth sends her incense up. From many a mountain shrine; From folded leaf and dewey cup She pours her sacred wine.

What is good looking, as Horace Smith remarks, but looking good? Be good, be womanly, be gentle,-generous in your sympathies, heedful of the well-being of all around you; and, my word for it, you will not lack kind words of admiration.

There is religion in everything around us, - a calm and holy religion in the unbreathing things of Nature, which man would do well to imitate.

A grateful loving heart carries with it, under every parallel of latitude, the warmth and light of the tropics. It plants its Eden in the wilderness and solitary place, and sows with flowers the gray desolation of rock and mosses.

The great eventful Present hides the Past; but through the din Of its loud life hints and echoes from the life behind steal in.

God should be most where man is least: So, where is neither church nor priest, And never rag nor form of creed To clothe the nakedness of need,- Where farmer folk in silence meet,- I turn my bell-unsummoned feet; I lay the critic's glass aside, I tread upon my lettered pride, And, lowest-seated, testify To the oneness of humanity; Confess the universal want, And share whatever Heaven may grant. He findeth not who seeks his own, The soul is lost that's saved alone.

Thee lift me, and I lift thee, and together we ascend.