William Allingham Quotes

I'm trying to do what I have never done - give the impression one has on entering a room: one sees everything and at the same time nothing.

To look is one thing, to see is another thing; to see is very difficult, normally; to look is to try to see. I have looked and I hope I have seen.

I'm very observant. I see more than people think I'm seeing.

Seeing is a gift that comes with practice.

One looks, looks long, and the world comes in.

Seeing the small is called clarity.

Look for the stars, you'll say that there are none; / Look up a second time, and, one by one, / You mark them twinkling out with silvery light, / And wonder how they could elude the sight!

Carlyle said that how to observe was to look, but I say that it is rather to see, and the more you look the less you will observe.

You see, but you do not observe.

People never notice anything.

What we see depends mainly on what we look for.

You can observe a lot by watching.

Look and you will find it - what is unsought will go undetected.

It takes little talent to see what lies under one's nose, a good deal to know in what direction to point that organ.

What people call serendipity sometimes is just having your eyes open.

He who closes his eyes sees nothing, even in the full light of day.

Most people don't see what's going on around them. That's my principal message to writers: 'For God's sake, keep your eyes open. Notice what's going on around you.'

While there is perhaps a province in which the photograph can tell us nothing more than what we see with our own eyes, there is another in which it proves to us how little our eyes permit us to see.

And if you don't have your ears open, you're not going to be able to figure out what you should be doing.

I'm just someone who observes a lot.

You have to have some kind of power of observation, almost like a trained observer.

If you pay attention to the world, it's an amazing place. If you don't, it's whatever you think it is.

If you slow things down, you notice things you hadn't seen before.

We must look a long time before we can see.

People tell you who they are. There are big neon signs going off. 'Pay attention! This is who I am.' And most of us put out hands a little bit over our eyes. We don't see that.