Famous quotes containing the words oliver wendell holmes, wendell holmes, oliver wendell, oliver and/or wendell:
“Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)
“It was a tall young oysterman lived by the river-side,
His shop was just upon the bank, his boat was on the tide;
The daughter of a fisherman, that was so straight and slim,
Lived over on the other bank, right opposite to him.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)
“A great calamity ... is as old as the trilobites an hour after it has happened.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)
“the hatchlings wake in the swaying branches,
in the silver baskets,
and love the world.
Is it necessary to say any more?
Have you heard them singing in the wind, above the final fields?
Have you ever been so happy in your life?”
—Mary Oliver (b. 1935)
“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)