Rare Winter Visitor

Famous quotes containing the words rare, winter and/or visitor:

    “At twelve I was determined to shoot only
    For honor; at twenty not to shoot at all;
    I know at thirty-three that one must shoot
    As often as one gets the rare chance—
    In killing there is more than commentary.”
    —Allen Tate (1899–1979)

    “We know of no scripture which records the pure benignity of the gods on a New England winter night. Their praises have never been sung, only their wrath deprecated. The best scripture, after all, records but a meagre faith. Its saints live reserved and austere. Let a brave, devout man spend the year in the woods of Maine or Labrador, and see if the Hebrew Scriptures speak adequately to his condition and experience.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    “In verity ... we are the poor. This humanity we would claim for ourselves is the legacy, not only of the Enlightenment, but of the thousands and thousands of European peasants and poor townspeople who came here bringing their humanity and their sufferings with them. It is the absence of a stable upper class that is responsible for much of the vulgarity of the American scene. Should we blush before the visitor for this deficiency?”
    —Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)