Think where man's glory most begins and ends, and say my glory was I had such friends.

Now that my ladder's gone, I must lie down where all my ladders start, In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.

There is no deformity But saves us from a dream.

Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that but simply growth, We are happy when we are growing.

Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.

A lonely impulse of delight

A line will take us hours maybe; / Yet if it does not seem a moment's thought, / Our stitching and unstitching has been naught... Better go down upon your marrow-bones / And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones... For to articulate sweet sounds together / Is to work harder than all these, and yet / Be thought an idler by the noisy set.