Skip to content

William Wordsworth on Nature

1770–1850 England

← All quotes by William Wordsworth

12 quotes

The light that never was, on sea or land,
The consecration, and the poet's dream.

Come forth into the light of things,
Let Nature be your teacher.

Lyrical Ballads (1798)

Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns.

On Revisiting the Banks of Wye (1798)

To the solid ground
Of Nature trusts the mind that builds for aye.

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed (1919)

As in the eye of Nature he has lived,
So in the eye of Nature let him die!

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed (1919)

And recognizes ever and anon
The breeze of Nature stirring in his soul.

The Excursion (1814)

Nature never did betray
The Heart that Loved her.

But ne'er to a seductive lay let faith be given;
Nor deem that "light that leads astray" is light from Heaven.

The streams with softest sound are flowing,
The grass you almost hear it growing,
You hear it now, if e'er you can.

The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.

Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed (1919)

Ah, what a warning for a thoughtless man,
Could field or grove, could any spot of earth,
Show to his eye an image of the pangs
Which it hath witnessed; render back an echo
Of the sad steps by which it hath been trod!

The Excursion (1814)

I dropped my pen; and listened to the wind
That sang of trees uptorn and vessels tost;
A midnight harmony and wholly lost
To the general sense of men by chains confined
Of business, care, or pleasure,—or resigned
To timely sleep.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: William Wordsworth (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.