Quotes by Edward Fitzgerald
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
I came like Water, and like Wind I go.
And much as Wine has played the Infidel, And robbed me of my Robe of Honor Well, I often wonder what the Vintners buy One half so precious as the stuff they sell.
A book of verses underneath the bough, A jug of wine, a loaf of bread-and thou.
And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky, Where under crawling coop'd we live and die, Lift not your hands to It for help for it As impotently moves as you or I.
Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot?
Taste is the feminine of genius.
Ah, take the Cash in hand and waive the Rest.
Strange, is it not? That of the myriads who Before us pass'd the door of Darkness through, Not one returns to tell us of the Road Which to discover we must travel too.
There was the Door to which I found no key; There was the Veil through which I might see.
I come like Water, and like Wind I go.
The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes, But Here or There as strikes the Player goes.
If you can prove to me that one miracle took place, I will believe he is a just God who damned us all because a woman ate an apple.
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop, The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.
Think then you are Today what Yesterday you were - Tomorrow you shall not be less.
I sometimes think that never blows so red The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled; That every Hyacinth the Garden wears Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head.
Yesterday This Day's Madness did prepare; tomorrow's Silence, Triumph, or Despair: Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why: Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.
I am all for the short and merry life.
Leave well - even 'pretty well' - alone that is what I learn as I get old.
I want to live my life so that my nights are full of regrets.
Intellectuals are people who believe that ideas are of more importance than values. That is to say, their own ideas and other people's values.
