Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton Quotes

1831–1891 England

Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton (8 November, 1831 – 24 November, 1891) was an English statesman, serving as Viceroy of India; and poet, under the pen name of Owen Meredith.

England
Academics
Novelists
Poets

Also known as: Edward Robert, Meredith, Owen, Owen Meredith

Random Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton quote

75 quotes

We are our own fates. Our own deeds
Are our doomsmen. Man's life was made
Not for men's creeds,
But men's actions.

Alas! must it ever be so?
Do we stand in our own light, wherever we go,
And fight our own shadows forever?

Far up the wave
The clouds that lay piled in the golden heat
Were turn'd into types of the ancient mountains
In an ancient land.

Clytemnestra and Other Poems (1855)

God be thank'd that the dead have left still
Good undone for the living to do—
Still some aim for the heart and the will
And the soul of a man to pursue.

Let any man show the world that he feels
Afraid of its bark and ’t will fly at his heels:
Let him fearlessly face it, ’t will leave him alone:
But ’t will fawn at his feet if he flings it a bone.

Lucile (1860)

The things which must be, must be for the best,
God helps us do our duty and not shrink,
And trust His mercy humbly for the rest.

Unseen hands delay
The coming of what oft seems close in ken,
And, contrary, the moment, when we say
"'Twill never come!" comes on us even then.

However we pass Time, he passes still,
Passing away whatever the pastime,
And, whether we use him well or ill,
Some day he gives us the slip for the last time.

Rest is sweet after strife.

Lucile (1860)

News, news, news, my gossiping friends,
I have wonderful news to tell,
A lady by me her compliments sends;
And this is the news from Hell!

Not a truth has to art or to science been given,
But brows have ached for it, and souls toil'd and striven;
And many have striven, and many have fail'd,
And many died, slain by the truth they assail'd.

Talk not of genius baffled. Genius is master of man;
Genius does what it must, and talent does what it can.
Blot out my name, that the spirits of Shakespeare and Milton and Burns
Look not down on the praises of fools with a pity my soul yet spurns.

Since we parted, yester eve,
I do love thee, love, believe,
Twelve times dearer, twelve hours longer,
One dream deeper, one night stronger,
One sun surer,—thus much more
Than I loved thee, love, before.

Who can undo
What time hath done? who can win back the wind?
Beckon lost music from a broken lute?
Renew the redness of a last year's rose?
Or dig the sunken sunset from the deep?

Thought alone is eternal.

Lucile (1860)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Robert Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.