"Mirth is better than fun and happiness is better than mirth."

"I went to the Garden of Love, And saw what I never had seen: A Chapel was built in the midst, Where I used to play on the green. And the gates of this Chapel were shut, And 'Thou shalt not' writ over the door; So I turn'd to the Garden of Love, That so many sweet flowers bore. And I saw it was filled with graves, And tomb-stones where flowers should be: And Priests in black gowns, were walking their rounds, And binding with briars, my joys & desires."

"Some are born to sweet delight, Some are born to endless night."

"The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity... and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself."

"The Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me, and I asked them how they dared so roundly to assert, that God spoke to them; and whether they did not think at the time, that they would be misunderstood, & so be the cause of imposition.Isaiah answer'd, I saw no God, nor heard any, in a finite organical perception; but my senses discover'd the infinite in every thing, and as I was then persuaded, & remain confirm'd; that the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I cared not for consequences but wrote."

"It is right it should be so Man was made for joy and woe And when this we rightly know Through the world we safely go."

"The fool who persists in his folly will become wise."

"What is now proved was once only imagined."

"Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth."

"To see the world in a grain of sand, and to see heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hands, and eternity in an hour."

"All futurity seems teeming with endless destruction never to be repelled, Desperate remorse swallows the present in a quenchless rage."

"The foundation of empire is art and science. Remove them or degrade them, and the empire is no more. Empire follows art and not vice versa as Englishmen suppose."

"For Mercy has a human heart;Pity, a human face;And Love, the human form divine:And Peace the human dress.Songs of InnocenceCruelty has a human heartAnd jealousy a human face,Terror the human form divine,And secrecy the human dress.The human dress is forged iron,The human form a fiery forge,The human face a furnace seal'd,The human heart its hungry gorge.Songs of Experience - This poem was discovered posthumously."

"Improvement makes straight roads but the crooked roads without improvement are roads of genius."

"When the stars threw down their spears, and watered heaven with their tears, did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the Lamb make thee?"

"Dip him in the river who loves water."

"And Priests in black gowns, were walking their rounds, And binding with briars, my joys & desires."

"The Old and New Testaments are the Great Code of Art."

"Time is the mercy of Eternity without Time's swiftness/ Which is the swiftest of all things: all were eternal torment."

"If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise."

"The tigers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction."

"The Devil answer'd: bray a fool in a morter with wheat, yet shall not his folly be beaten out of him; if Jesus Christ is the greatest man, you ought to love him in the greatest degree; now hear how he has given his sanction to the law of ten commandments: did he not mock at the sabbath, and so mock the sabbaths God? murder those who were murder'd because of him? turn away the law from the woman taken in adultery? steal the labor of others to support him? bear false witness when he omitted making a defense before Pilate? covet when he pray'd for his disciples, and when he bid them shake off the dust of their feet against such as refused to lodge them? I tell you, no virtue can exist without breaking these ten commandments; Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules."

"I was angry with my friend: I told my wrath, my wrath did end. I was angry with my foe: I told it not, my wrath did grow."

"Expect poison from the standing water."

"I am in you and you in me, mutual in divine love."

"The thankful receiver bears a plentiful harvest."

"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom."

"Imitation is criticism."

"If a thing loves, it is infinite."

"Exuberance is beauty."

"The cut worm forgives the plow."

"The weak in courage is strong in cunning."

"The difference between a bad artist and a good one is: the bad artist seems to copy a great deal; the good one really does."

"The true method of knowledge is experiment."

"A man can't soar too high, when he flies with his own wings."

"I know of no other Christianity and of no other Gospel than the liberty both of body & mind to exercise the Divine Arts of ImaginationImagination the real & eternal World of which this Vegetable Universe is but a faint shadow & in which we shall live in our Eternal or Imaginative Bodies, when these Vegetable Mortal Bodies are no more. The Apostles knew of no other Gospel."

"To the eyes of a miser a guinea is more beautiful than the sun, and a bag worn with the use of money has more beautiful proportions than a vine filled with grapes."

"Opposition is true friendship."

"Everything that lives lives not alone nor for itself."

"He whose face gives no light, shall never become a star."

"I have no name: I am but two days old. What shall I call thee? I happy am, Joy is my name. Sweet joy befall thee!"

"Do what you will, this world's a fiction and is made up of contradiction."

"He who desires but acts not breeds pestilence."

"The hours of folly are measured by the clock; but of wisdom, no clock can measure."

"My mother groaned, my father wept,into the dangerous world I leapt."

"Better to shun the bait than struggle in the snare."

"Travelers repose and dream among my leaves."

"Prudence is a rich, ugly, old maid courted by incapacity."

"A Robin Redbreast in a CagePuts all Heaven in a Rage.A dove house fill'd with doves and pigeonsShudders Hell thro' all its regions.A Dog starv'd at his Master's GatePredicts the ruin of the State.A Horse misus'd upon the RoadCalls to Heaven for Human blood.Each outcry of the hunted HareA fiber from the Brain does tear."

"He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity's sun rise."