William Butler Yeats

Come away, O human child: To the waters and the wild with a fairy, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.

Think where man's glory most begins and ends, and say my glory was I had such friends.

How far away the stars seem, and how far is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart.

Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking.

People who lean on logic and philosophy and rational exposition end by starving the best part of the mind.

Why should we honour those that die upon the field of battle? A man may show as reckless a courage in entering into the abyss of himself.

Wine comes in at the mouth And love comes in at the eye; That's all we shall know for truth Before we grow old and die.

I heard the old, old, men say 'all that's beautiful drifts away, like the waters.'