Democracy is the form of government that gives every man the right to be his own oppressor.
About James Russell Lowell
James Russell Lowellwas an American Romantic poet, critic, editor, and diplomat. He is associated with the fireside poets, a group of New England writers who were among the first American poets that rivaled the popularity of British poets.
More quotes from James Russell Lowell
Fate loves the fearless.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The heart forgets its sorrow and ache.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Who’s not sat tense before his own heart’s curtain.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Each day the world is born anew for him who takes it rightly.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
It is by presence of mind in untried emergencies that the native metal of man is tested.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The eye is the notebook of the poet.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Every person born into this world their work is born with them.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
A weed is no more than a flower in disguise, Which is seen through at once, if love give a man eyes.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Toward no crimes have men shown themselves so cold- bloodedly cruel as in punishing differences of belief.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
No man can produce great things who is not thoroughly sincere in dealing with himself.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
In the ocean of baseness, the deeper we get, the easier the sinking.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Mishaps are like knives, that either serve us or cut us, as we grasp them by the blade or the handle.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Greatly begin. Though thou have time, but for a line, be that sublime. Not failure, but low aim is crime.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
He who is firmly seated in authority soon learns to think security, and not progress, the highest lesson in statecraft.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The foolish and the dead alone never change their opinions.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Blessed are they who have nothing to say and who cannot be persuaded to say it.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Where one person shapes their life by precept and example, there are a thousand who have shaped it by impulse and circumstances.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Once to every person and nation come the moment to decide. In the conflict of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
As life runs on, the road grows strange with faces new – and near the end. The milestones into headstones change, Neath every one a friend.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Thank God every morning when you get up that you have something to do that day, which must be done, whether you like it or not.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Fortune is the rod of the weak, and the staff of the brave.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Every man feels instinctively that all the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
True scholarship consists in knowing not what things exist, but what they mean; it is not memory but judgment.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Not failure, but low aim, is crime.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Creativity is not the finding of a thing, but the making something out of it after it is found.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Democracy is the form of government that gives every man the right to be his own oppressor.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
To educate the intelligence is to expand the horizon of its wants and desires.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Children are God’s Apostles, sent forth, day by day, to preach of love, and hope, and peace.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The only faith that wears well and holds its color in all weathers is that which is woven of conviction and set with the sharp mordant of experience.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
There is no good in arguing with the inevitable. The only argument available with an east wind is to put on your overcoat.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
If youth be a defect, it is one that we outgrow only too soon.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
In creating, the only hard thing is to begin: a grass blade’s no easier to make than an oak.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
I have always been of the mind that in a democracy manners are the only effective weapons against the bowie-knife.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
There is nothing so desperately monotonous as the sea, and I no longer wonder at the cruelty of pirates.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Reputation is only a candle, of wavering and uncertain flame, and easily blown out, but it is the light by which the world looks for and finds merit.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Poetry is something to make us wiser and better, by continually revealing those types of beauty and truth, which God has set in all men’s souls.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Truth, after all, wears a different face to everybody, and it would be too tedious to wait till all were agreed.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Endurance is the crowning quality, And patience all the passion of great hearts.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Sincerity is impossible, unless it pervade the whole being, and the pretence of it saps the very foundation of character.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
It is the privilege of genius that life never grows common place, as it does for the rest of us.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
There are two kinds of weakness, that which breaks and that which bends.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The mind can weave itself warmly in the cocoon of its own thoughts, and dwell a hermit anywhere.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Death is delightful. Death is dawn, The waking from a weary night Of fevers unto truth and light.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Good luck is the willing handmaid of a upright and energetic character, and conscientious observance of duty.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Solitude is as needful to the imagination as society is wholesome for the character.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The greatest homage we can pay to truth, is to use it.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Freedom is the only law which genius knows.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Democracy gives every man the right to be his own oppressor.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Compromise makes a good umbrella, but a poor roof; it is temporary expedient, often wise in party politics, almost sure to be unwise in statesmanship.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Incredulity robs us of many pleasures, and gives us nothing in return.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
What a sense of security in an old book which time has criticized for us.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Let us be of good cheer, however, remembering that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never come.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Folks never understand the folks they hate.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Light is the symbol of truth.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
What men prize most is a privilege, even if it be that of chief mourner at a funeral.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
Usually when people are sad, they don’t do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
On one issue at least, men and women agree; they both distrust women.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
The surest plan to make a man is, think him so.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)
A great man is made up of qualities that meet or make great occasions.
American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat (1819-1891)