1,059 Quotes by William Butler Yeats

While man can still his body keep Wine or love drug him to sleep, Waking he thanks the Lord that he Has body and its stupidity...

O hiding hair and dewy eyes, I am no more with life and death, My heart upon his warm heart lies, My breath is mixed into his breath.

Lionel Johnson comes the first to mind, That loved his learning better than mankind, Though courteous to the worst; much falling he Brooded upon sanctity...

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 release In a bodkin or disease, Nor can there be a work so great As that which cleans man’s dirty slate.

Do you not hear me calling, white deer with no horns? I have been changed to a hound with one red ear; I have been in the Path of Stones and the Wood of Thorns...

Endure what life God gives and ask no longer span; Cease to remember the delights of youth, travel-wearied aged man; Delight becomes death-longing if all longing else be vain.

I think it better that in times like these a poet’s mouth be silent, for in truth we have no gift to set a statesman right.

When a man grows old his joy Grows more deep day after day, His empty heart is full at length But he has need of all that strength Because of the increasing Night That opens her mystery and fright.