Behind him lay the gray Azores, Behind the gates of Hercules; Before him not the ghost of shores, Before him only shorless seas. The good Mate said, Now we must pray, For lo! the very stars are gone. Brave Admiral, speak, what shall I say? Why say, 'Sail on! sail on! and on! My men grow mutinous day by day; My men grow ghastly wan and weak! The stout Mate thought of home; a spray Of salt wavewashed his swarthy cheek. What shall I say, brave Admiral, say, If we sight naught but seas at dawn? Why, you shall say at break of day, 'Sail on! sail on! sail on! and on!' They sailed. They sailed. Then spake the Mate; This mad sea shows its teeth tonight. He curls his lip, he lies in wait, With lifted teeth, as if to bite! Brave Admiral, say but one good word; What shall we do when hope is gone? The words leapt like a leaping sword; Sail on! sail on! sail on! and on! Then, pale and worn, he kept his deck And peered through darkness. Ah! that night Of all dark nights! And then a speck -- A light! A light! A light! A light! It grew, a starlit flag unfurled! It grew to be Time's burst of dawn. He gained a world; he gave that world Its greatest lesson: On! sail on!
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There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the year's course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word 'happy' would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.
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One Christmas was so much like another,...that I can never remember whether it snowed for six days and six nights when I was twleve or whether it snowed for twelve days and twelve nights when I was six.
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One summer night, out on a flat headland, all but surrounded by the waters of the bay, the horizons were remote and distant rims on the edge of space. Millions of stars blazed in darkness, and on the far shore a few lights burned in cottages. Otherwise there was no reminder of human life. My companion and I were alone with the stars: the misty river of the Milky Way flowing across the sky, the patterns of the constellations standing out bright and clear, a blazing planet low on the horizon. It occurred to me that if this were a sight that could be seen only once in a century, this little headland would be thronged with spectators. But it can be seen many scores of nights in any year, and so the lights burned in the cottages and the inhabitants probably gave not a thought to the beauty overhead; and because they could see it almost any night, perhaps they never will.
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Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear--not absence of fear. Except a creature be part coward, it is not a compliment to say it is brave; it is merely a loose misapplication of the word. Consider the flea!--incomparably the bravest of all the creatures of God, if ignorance of fear were courage. Whether you are asleep or awake he will attack you, caring nothing for the fact that in bulk and strength you are to him as are the massed armies of the earth to a sucking child; he lives both day and night and all days and nights in the very lap of peril and the immediate presence of death, and yet is no more afraid than is the man who walks the streets of a city that was threatened by an earthquake ten centuries before. When we speak of Clive, Nelson, and Putnam as men who didn't know what fear was, we ought always to add the flea--and put him at the head of the procession.
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Never again clutter your days or nights with so many menial and unimportant things that you have no time to accept a real challenge when it comes along. This applies to play as well as work. A day merely survived is no cause for celebration. You are not here to fritter away your precious hours when you have the ability to accomplish so much by making a slight change in your routine. No more busy work. No more hiding from success. Leave time, leave space, to grow. Now. Now! Not tomorrow!
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I remember a dream two nights ago: the voice, 'the artist must create himself or be born again.'
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You must read, you must persevere, you must sit up nights, you must inquire, and exert the utmost power of your mind. If one way does not lead to the desired meaning, take another; if obstacles arise, then still another; until, if your strength holds out, you will find that clear which at first looked dark.
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But only a brief moment
is granted to the brave
one breath or two, whose wage is
The long nights of the grave.
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People who use their erudition to write for a learned minority... don't seem to me favored by fortune but rather to be pitied for their continuous self-torture. They add, change, remove, lay aside, take up, rephrase, show to their friends, keep for nine years and are never satisfied. And their futile reward, a word of praise from a handful of people, they win at such a cost -- so many late nights, such loss of sleep, sweetest of all things, and so much sweat and anguish... their health deteriorates, their looks are destroyed, they suffer partial or total blindness, poverty, ill-will, denial of pleasure, premature old age and early death.
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I feel them steal softly upon my thoughts, pattering gently like drops of rain against my window of thought. And so I lay, wandering the long halls of my thoughts, allowing the shades of memory to slip quietly through my mind, remembering starlight and shadows, days of refulgent glory and nights of moonless pitch, and I allow the needle of the tiny compass inside me to swing wildly… First towards the bright dawn of the morrow…then towards the long night behind me: and I think, and I wonder… When Fate comes to collect one of her sons… which way will the compass lie?
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Even if I was well - I must make myself as good a Philosopher as possible. Now I have had opportunities of passing nights anxious and awake I have found other thoughts intrude upon me. If I should die, said I to myself, I have left no immortal work behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have lov'd the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remember'd.
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Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye, I watched that wretched man, And since, I never dare to write As funny as I can.
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I want to live my life so that my nights are full of regrets.
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His hard work, dedication and leadership gave him and our team many great nights this season.
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Let me have men about me that are fat, Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep o' nights Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look He thinks too much such men are dangerous.
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They say foul beings of Old Times still lurk In dark forgotten corners of the world, And Gates still gape to loose, on certain nights, Shapes pent in Hell.
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I can say with pride that I have spent days and nights not reading anything, and that with unflagging energy I use every moment to acquire gra...
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When we hate our enemies, we are giving them power over us: power over our sleep, our appetites, our blood pressure, our health, and our happiness. Our enemies would dance with joy if only they knew how they were worrying us, lacerating us, and getting even with us! Our hate is not hurting them at all, but our hate is turning our own days and nights into a hellish turmoil.
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A man ninety years old was asked to what he attributed his longevity. I reckon, he said, with a twinkle in his eye, it because most nights I went to bed and slept when I should have sat up and worried.
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A man ninety years old was asked to what he attributed his longevity. 'I reckon,' he asid, with a twinkle in his eye, 'It's because most nights I went to bed and slept when I should have sat up and worried.
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These earthly godfathers of Heaven's lights, that give a name to every fixed star, have no more profit of their shining nights than those that walk and know not what they are.
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Thought is only a flash between two long nights, but this flash is everything.
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But my most favourite pursuit, after my daily exertions at the Foundry, was Astronomy. There were frequently clear nights when the glorious objects in the Heavens were seen in most attractive beauty and brilliancy.
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You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief, But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.
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Find out what's keeping them up nights and offer hope. Your theme must be an answer to their fears.
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Let me have men about me that are fat, sleek-headed men and such as sleep a-nights. Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look. He thinks too much. Such men are dangerous.
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A man ninety years old was asked to what he attributed his longevity. 'I reckon,' he asid, with a twinkle in his eye, 'It's because most nights I went to bed and slept when I should have sat up and worried.'
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Let me have men about me that are fat, Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep a-nights....
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Time is an abyss. Profound as a thousand nights... Centuries come and go... To be unable to grow old is terrible.
Death is not the worst... There are things more horrible than death. Can you imagine... Enduring centuries... experiencing each day with the same futile things.
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