John Masefield Quotations

One road leads to London, / One road runs to Wales, / My road leads me seawards / To the white dipping sails.

Laugh and be merry, remember, better the world with a song. / Better the world with a blow in the teeth of a wrong.

Success is the brand on the brow of a man who has aimed too low.

My race being run, I love to watch the race

Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain.

I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life,To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's o

I must down to the sea again, for the call of the running tide / Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied.

Death opens unknown doors. It is most grand to die.

And may we find when ended is the page, Death but a tavern on our pilgrimage.

The corn that makes the holy bread By which the soul of man is fed, The holy bread, the food unpriced, Thy everlasting mercy, Christ.

O lovely lily clean, O lily springing green, O lily bursting white, Dear lily of delight, Spring in my heart agen That I may flower to men.

So death obscures your gentle form, So memory strives to make the darkness bright; And, in that heap of rocks, your body lies, Part of the island till the planet ends, My gentle comrade, beautiful and wise, Part of this crag this bitter surge offends, While I, who pass, a little obscure thing, War with this force, and breathe, and am its king.

So shall I fight, so shall I tread, In this long war beneath the stars; So shall a glory wreathe my head, So shall I faint and show the scars, Until this case, this clogging mould, Be smithied all to kingly gold.

In the power and splendor of the universe, inspiration waits for the millions to come. Man has only to strive for it. Poems greater than the Iliad, plays greater than Macbeth, stories more engaging than Don Quixote await their seeker and finder.

Man with his burning soul Has but an hour of breath To build a ship of Truth In which his soul may sail- Sail on the sea of death. For death takes toll Of beauty, courage, youth, Of all but Truth.

It ought to have gangsters, and aeroplanes and a lot of automatic pistols.

Commonplace people dislike tragedy because they dare not suffer and cannot exult.

I must go down to the sea again For the call of the running tide It's a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied.

But he has gone, A nation's memory and veneration, Among the radiant, ever venturing on, Somewhere, with morning, as such spirits will.

The Thames is a wretched river after the Mersey and the ships are not like Liverpool ships and the docks are barren of beauty ... it is a beastly hole after Liverpool; for Liverpool is the town of my heart and I would rather sail a mudflat there than command a clipper out of London

Poetry is a mixture of common sense, which not all have, with an uncommon sense, which very few have.

The luck will alter and the star will rise.

From '41 to '51I was my folk's contrary son;I bit my father's hand right throughAnd broke my mother's heart in two.

Heaven to me's a fair blue stretch of sky, Earth's jest a dusty road.

Life's battle is a conquest for the strong; The meaning shows in the defeated thing.

In the dark room where I began My mother's life made me a man. Through all the months of human birth Her beauty fed my common earth. I cannot see, nor breathe, nor stir, But through the death of some of her.

The distant soul can shake the distant friend's soul and make the longing felt, over untold miles.

Life, a beauty chased by tragic laughter.

In this life he laughs longest who laughs last.

Love is a flame to set the will on fire

I have seen flowers come in stony places And kind things done by men with ugly faces, And the gold cup won by the worst horse at the races, So I trust, too.

Only the road and the dawn, the sun, the wind, and the rain, And the watch fire under stars, and sleep, and the road again.

On the long dusty ribbon of the long city street, The pageant of life is passing me on multitudinous feet, With a word here of the hills, and a song there of the sea And-the great movement changes-the pageant passes me.

His face was filled with broken commandments.

People who leave their own time out of their work cannot be surprised if their time fails to find them interesting.

There are few earthly things more beautiful than a university a place where those who hate ignorance may strive to know, where those who perceive truth may strive to make others see.

Most roads lead men homewards, My road leads me forth

Oh some are fond of Spanish wine, and some are fond of French.

I have seen the Lady April bringing the daffodils, Bringing the springing grass and the soft warm April rain.

Off Cape Horn there are but two kinds of weather, neither one of them a pleasant kind.

Love is a flame to burn out human wills, Love is a flame to set the will on fire, Love is a flame to cheat men into mire.

All ye that pass by! While we least think it he prepares his Mate. Mate, and the King's pawn played, it never ceases, Though all the earth is dust of taken pieces.

It's a warm wind, the west wind, full of birds' cries.

The Lord who gave us Earth and Heaven Takes that as thanks for all He's given. The book he lent is given back All blotted red and smutted black.

My road leads me seawards To the white dipping sails.

I have seen dawn and sunset on moors and windy hills Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain.

All the great things of life are swiftly done, Creation, death, and love the double gate. However much we dawdle in the sun We have to hurry at the touch of Fate.

The social states of human kinds Are made by multitudes of minds, And after multitudes of years A little human growth appears Worth having, even to the soul Who sees most plain it's not the whole.

Each one could be a Jesus mild, Each one has been a little child, A little child with laughing look, A lovely white unwritten book; A book that God will take, my friend, As each goes out at journey's end.

Lord, give to me who are old and rougher The things that little children suffer, And let keep bright and undefiled The young years of the little child.

When the last sea is sailed and last shallow charted, When the last field is reaped and the last harvest stored, When the last fire is out and the last guest departed Grant the last prayer that I pray, Be good to me, O Lord.

When Life knocks at the door no one can wait, When Death makes his arrest we have to go.

State are not made, nor patched; they grow; Grow slow through centuries of pain, And grow correctly in the main; But only grow by certain laws, Of certain bits in certain jaws.

It is too maddening. I've got to fly off, right now, to some devilish navy yard, three hours in a seasick steamer, and after being heartily sick, I'll have to speak three times, and then I'll be sick coming home. Still, who would not be sick for England?

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life, To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

Man cannot call the brimming instant back; Time's an affair of instants spun to days; If man must make an instant gold, or black, Let him, he may; but Time must go his ways. Life may be duller for an instant's blaze. Life's an affair of instants spun to years, Instants are only cause of all these tears.

What am I, Life? A thing of watery salt Held in cohesion by unresting cells, Which work they know not why, which never halt, Myself unwitting where their Master dwells?

Life is a long headache in a noisy street.

Since the printing press came into being, poetry has ceased to be the delight of the whole community of man; it has become the amusement and delight of the few.

Once in a century a man may be ruined or made insufferable by praise. But surely once in a minute something generous dies for want of it.

God warms his hands at man's heart when he prays.

God dropped a spark down into everyone, And if we find and fan it to a blaze, It'll spring up and glow, like--like the sun, And light the wandering out of stony ways.

Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.

All I ask is a tall ship and a star to sail her by.

Men in a ship are always looking up, and men ashore are usually looking down.

It's a warm wind, the west wind, full of birds' cries; I never hear the west wind but tears are in my eyes. For it comes from the west lands, the old brown hills, And April's in the West wind, and daffodils.

And he who gives a child a treat Makes joy-bells ring in Heaven's street, And he who gives a child a home Builds palaces in Kingdom come, And she who gives a baby birth Brings Saviour Christ again to Earth.

Humans consist of body, mind and imagination. Our bodies are faulty, our minds untrustworthy, but our imagination has made us remarkable.

It may be that we cease; we cannot tell. Even if we cease, life is a miracle.

Man's body is faulty, his mind untrustworthy, but his imagination has made him remarkable.

Success is the brand on the brow of the man who aimed too low.

The three foundations of judgement: Bold Design, Constant Practice, and Frequent Mistakes.

To most of us the future seems unsure. But then it always has been; and we who have seen great changes must have great hopes.

I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky; and all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by.

The days that make us happy make us wise

I hold that when a person dies / His soul returns again to earth; / Arrayed in some new flesh disguise / Another mother gives him birth / With sturdier limbs and brighter brain.