I consider poetry very subordinate to moral and political science.

The sunlight claps the earth, and the moonbeams kiss the sea: what are all these kissings worth, if thou kiss not me?

Is it not odd that the only generous person I ever knew, who had money to be generous with, should be a stockbroker.

Poetry is a sword of lightning, ever unsheathed, which consumes the scabbard that would contain it.

I consider poetry very subordinate to moral and political science.

Man's yesterday may never be like his morrow; Nought may endure but Mutability.

The mind in creation is as a fading coal, which some invisible influence, like an inconstant wind, awakens to transitory brightness; this power arises from within...could this influence be durable in its original purity and force, it is impossible to predict the greatness of the result; but when composition begins, inspiration is already on the decline; and the most glorious poetry that has been communicated to the world is probably a feeble shadow of the original conceptions of the poet.