Quotes by John Keats

"Poetry should surprise by a fine excess, and not by singularity; it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance."

"Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard  Are sweeter."

"Fanatics have their dreams, wherewith they weave A paradise for a sect."

"Ever let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home."

"The imagination of a boy is healthy, and the mature imagination of a man is healthy; but there is a space of life between, in which the soul is in a ferment, the character undecided, the way of life uncertain, the ambition thick-sighted: thence proceeds mawkishness."

"You speak of Lord Byron and me; there is this great difference between us. He describes what he sees I describe what I imagine. Mine is the hardest task."

"Though a quarrel in the streets is a thing to be hated, the energies displayed in it are fine; the commonest man shows a grace in his quarrel."

"Philosophy will clip an angel's wings."

"The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts."

"I would sooner fail than not be among the greatest."

"Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter."

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever: its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness."

"You are always new, the last of your kisses was ever the sweetest."

"Now a soft kiss - Aye, by that kiss, I vow an endless bliss."

"I will give you a definition of a proud man: he is a man who has neither vanity nor wisdom one filled with hatreds cannot be vain, neither can he be wise."

"Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself, but with its subject."

"Poetry should surprise by a fine excess and not by singularity, it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance."

"Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance."

"There is an electric fire in human nature tending to purify - so that among these human creatures there is continually some birth of new heroism. The pity is that we must wonder at it, as we should at finding a pearl in rubbish."

"Scenery is fine - but human nature is finer."