Samuel Taylor Coleridge Quotes

A poet ought not to pick nature's pocket. Let him borrow, and so borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing. Examine nature accurately, but write from recollection, and trust more to the imagination than the memory.

Advice is like snow; the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into, the mind.

I have seen gross intolerance shown in support of tolerance.

If you would stand well with a great mind, leave him with a favorable impression of yourself; if with a little mind, leave him with a favorable impression of himself.

Oh sleep! It is a gentle thing, Beloved from pole to pole.

Only the wise possess ideas; the greater part of mankind are possessed by them.

There is no such thing as a worthless book though there are some far worse than worthless; no book that is not worth preserving, if its existence may be tolerated; as there may be some men whom it may be proper to hang, but none should be suffered to starve.

What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole, its body brevity, and wit its soul.

Works of imagination should be written in very plain language; the more purely imaginative they are the more necessary it is to be plain.

Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink.