John Donne Quotes

Lines I die but when the grave shall press The heart so long endeared to thee When earthy cares no more distress And earthy joys are nought to me. Weep not, but think that I have past Before thee o'er the sea of gloom. Have anchored safe and rest at last Where tears and mouring can not come. 'Tis I should weep to leave thee here On that dark ocean sailing drear With storms around and fears before And no kind light to point the shore. But long or short though life may be 'Tis nothing to eternity. We part below to meet on high Where blissful ages never die.

The idea of immortality, that like a sea has ebbed and flowed in the human heart, with its countless waves of hope and fear, beating against the shores and rocks of time and fate, was not born of any book, nor of any creed, nor of any religion. It was born of human affection, and it will continue to ebb and flow beneath the mists and clouds of doubt and darkness as long as love kisses the lips of death. It is the rainbow -- Hope shining upon the tears of grief.

Sad hours and glad hours, and all hours, pass over; One thing unshaken stays: Life, that hath Death for spouse, hath Chance for lover; Whereby decays, Each thing save one thing: mid this strife diurnal, Of hourly change begot, Love that is God-born, bides as God eternal, And changes not; Nor means a tinseled dream pursuing lovers, Find altered by-and-bye, When, with possession, time anon discovers, Trapped dreams must die, - For he that visions God, of mankind gathers, One manlike trait alone, And reverently imputes to Him a father's love for his son.

The years keep coming and going, Men will arise & depart; Only one thing is immortal: The love that is in my heart.

Had we but world enough, and time, This coyness Lady were no crime. We would sit down, and think which way To walk, and pass our long love's day. Thou by the Indian Ganges'side Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide Of Humber would complain. I would Love you ten years before the flood.

But soon we shall die and all memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves shall be loved for a while and forgotten. But the love will have been enough; all those impulses of love return to the love that made them. Even memory is not necessary for love. There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.

When I say forever,' Koschei whispered, 'I mean until the black death of the world. An Ivan means just the present moment, the flickering light of it, in a green field, his mouth on yours. He means the stretching of that moment. But forever isn't bright; it isn't like that. Forever is cold and hard and final.

What is any of this to us? Time is endless and ours. Love and Death are only the games we play in it.

The point is, as death gets closer - what's so wrong with wanting someone you love to live forever?

We need to be together." "Why?" I asked softly. The word was carried away on the wind, but he heard. "Because I want you." I gave him a sad smile, wondering if we'd meet again in the land of the dead. "Wrong answer," I told him. I let go

Love wishes to perpetuate itself. Love wishes for immortality.

You haven't lost anything when you know were it is. Death can hide but not divide.

No man can pass into eternity, for he is already in it.

I can imagine myself on my death-bed, spent utterly with lust to touch the next world, like a boy asking for his first kiss from a woman.

I think that one of the reasons why people look towards the end of humanity is that people are afraid to die alone. If you die alone, the people you love will miss you, or if they die, you miss them - the sorrow is inevitable. When you truly love someone, the thought of losing them forever is horrible.

If you live to be 1000 years old, I hope I live to be 1000 minus 1 day, so I never have to live without you.

We pass now quickly from each other's sight; but I know full well that where beyond these passing scenes you shall be, there will be Heaven.

When Time is spent, Eternity begins.

Love and memory last and will so endure till the game is called because of darkness.

Not where I breathe, but where I love, I live; Not where I love, but where I am, I die.

I wish to believe in immortality-I wish to live with you forever.

The religious man, the mystic, tries to explore the mystery of death. In exploring the mystery of death, he inevitably comes to know what life is, what love is. Those are not his goals. His goal is to penetrate death, because there seems to be nothing more mysterious than death. Love has some mystery because of death, and life also has some mystery because of death.

I wish I had a hundred years, she said, very quietly. A hundred years I could give to you.

As the presence of those we love is as a double life, so absence, in its anxious longing and sense of vacancy, is as a foretaste of death.