Edmund Clarence Stedman
Poetry is an art, and chief of the fine art; the easiest to dabble in, the hardest in which to reach true excellence.Collection: Poetry
Fashion is a potency in art, making it hard to judge between the temporary and the lasting.
Yes, there's a luck in most things; and in none more than being born at the right time.
Faith and joy are the ascensive forces of song.Collection: Song
Genius does not need a special language; it uses newly whatever tongue it finds.Collection: Special
Progress comes by experiment, and this from ennui that leads to voyages, wars, revolutions, and plainly to change in the arts of expression; that cries out to the imagination, and is the nurse of the invention whereof we term necessity the mother.Collection: Mother
Men are egotists, and not all tolerant of one man's selfhood; they do not always deem the amities elective.Collection: Men
Natural emotion is the soul of poetry, as melody is of music; the same faults are engendered by over-study of either art; there is a lack of sincerity, of irresistible impulse in both the poet and the, composer.Collection: Art
A poet must sing for his own people.Collection: People
The poet is a creator, not an iconoclast, and never will tamely endeavor to say in prose what can only be expressed in song.Collection: Song
A critic must accept what is best in a poet, and thus become his best encourager.Collection: Poet
The imagination never dies.Collection: Imagination
Whither away, Bluebird, Whither away? The blast is chill, yet in the upper sky Thou still canst find the color of thy wing, The hue of May. Warbler, why speed, thy southern flight? ah, why, Thou, too, whose song first told us of the Spring? Whither away?Collection: Song
Do your heart and head keep pace? When does hoary Love expire, When do frosts put out the fire? Can its embers burn below All that chill December snow?Collection: Heart
The critic's first labor is the task of distinguishing between men, as history and their works display them, and the ideals which one and another have conspired to urge upon his acceptance.Collection: Acceptance
The poet who does not revere his art, and believe in its sovereignty, is not born to wear the purple.Collection: Art
Alas, by what rude fate Our lives, like ships at sea, an instant meet, Then part forever on their courses fleet.Collection: Fate
Look on this cast, and know the hand That bore a nation in its hold; From this mute witness understand What Lincoln was - how large of mould.Collection: Hands
Science has but one fashion-to lose nothing once gained.Collection: Fashion