Quotes about Inspiration

And it might be well to assume and state openly that other people have the virtue you want them to develop. Give them a fine reputation to live up to, and they will make prodigious efforts rather than see you disillusioned.

Abilities wither under criticism; they blossom under encouragement. To become a more effective leader of people, apply…     Principle 6 Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be "hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise.

The ability to read opened up a new and magic world for him, a world he had never dreamed of before. It changed him. It broadened his horizon and gave him vision; and, for a quarter of a century, reading remained the dominant passion of his life.

Your very flesh shall be a great poem...

A writer can do nothing for men more necessary, satisfying, than just simply to reveal to them the infinite possibility of their own souls.

I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell

Why should I wish to see God better than this day? I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then, In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass; I find letters from God dropped in the street, and every one is signed by God's name, And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.

Shocked? I consider Bob one of the constellations of our time — of our country — America — a bright, magnificent constellation. Besides, all the constellations—not alone of this but of any time—shock the average intelligence for a while. In one respect that helps to prove it a constellation. Think of Voltaire , Paine , Hicks, not to say anything of modern men whom we could mention. {Whitman's thoughts on his close friend, the great Robert Ingersoll }

Give me such shows--give me the streets of Manhattan!

He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher. -from Song of Myself

The chief trait of any given poet is always the spirit he brings to the observation of Humanity and Nature—the mood out of which he contemplates his subjects.

I will make the poems of materials, for I think they are to be the most         spiritual poems; And I will make the poems of my body and of mortality, For I think I shall then supply myself with the poems of my soul, and of         immortality.