Children are never too tender to be whipped. Like tough beefsteaks, the more you beat them, the more tender they become.
Edgar Allan PoeNo pictorial or sculptural combinations of points of human loveliness, do more than approach the living and breathing human beauty as it gladdens our daily path.
Edgar Allan PoeDeep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?" This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!" โ Merely this, and nothing more
Edgar Allan PoeAnd because our reason violently deters us from the brink, therefore, do we the more impetuously approach it. There is no passion in nature so demoniacally impatient, as that of him, who shuddering upon the edge of a precipice, thus meditates a plunge. To indulge for a moment, in any attempt at thought, is to be inevitably lost; for reflection but urges us to forbear, and therefore it is, I say, that we cannot. If there be no friendly arm to check us, or if we fail in a sudden effort to prostrate ourselves backward from the abyss, we plunge, and are destroyed.
Edgar Allan PoeI would define, in brief, the Poetry of words as the Rhythmical Creation of Beauty. Its sole arbiter is taste. With the intellect or with the conscience, it has only collateral relations. Unless incidentally, it has no concern whatever either with duty or with truth.
Edgar Allan PoeGaily bedight, A gallant knight, In sunshine and in shadow, Had journeyed long, Singing a song, In search of Eldorado. But he grew oldโ This knight so boldโ And oโer his heart a shadowโ Fell as he found No spot of ground That looked like Eldorado. And, as his strength Failed him at length, He met a pilgrim shadowโ โShadow,โ said he, โWhere can it beโ This land of Eldorado?โ โOver the Mountains Of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride, boldly ride,โ The shade replied,โ โIf you seek for Eldorado!
Edgar Allan Poe