Oliver Wendell Holmes

Famous quotes containing the words oliver wendell holmes, wendell holmes, oliver wendell and/or wendell:

    —First a shiver, and then a thrill,
    Then something decidedly like a spill,—
    And the parson was sitting up on a rock,
    At half-past nine by the meet’n’-house clock,—
    Just the hour of the Earthquake shock!
    MWhat do you think the parson found,
    When he got up and stared around?
    The poor old chaise in a heap or mound,
    As if it had been to the mill and ground!
    Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called “facts.” They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain. Who does not know fellows that always have an ill-conditioned fact or two that they lead after them into decent company like so many bull-dogs, ready to let them slip at every ingenious suggestion, or convenient generalization, or pleasant fancy? I allow no “facts” at this table.
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    The morning cup of coffee has an exhiliration about it which the cheering influence of the afternoon or evening cup of tea cannot be expected to reproduce.
    Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    Me wretched! Let me curr to quercine shades!
    Effund your albid hausts, lactiferous maids!
    O, might I vole to some umbrageous clump,—
    Depart,—be off,—excede,—evade,—erump!
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)