Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Stars
The spacious firmament on nigh,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim.
Forever singing, as they shine,
The hand that made us is divine.
Addison—Ode. The Spacious Firmament on High.
Surely the stars are images of love.
Bailey—Festus. Sc. Garden and Bower by the Sea.
What are ye orbs?
The words of God? the Scriptures of the skies?
Bailey—Festus. Sc. Everywhere.
The stars,
Which stand as thick as dewdrops on the fields
Of heaven.
Bailey—Festus. Sc. Heaven.
The sad and solemn night
Hath yet her multitude of cheerful fires;
The glorious host of light
Walk the dark hemisphere till she retires;
All through her silent watches, gliding slow,
Her constellations come, and climb the heavens, and go.
Bryant—Hymn to the North Star.
When stars are in the quiet skies,
Then most I pine for thee;
Bend on me then thy tender eyes,
As stars look on the sea.
Bulwer-Lytton—When Stars are in the Quiet Skies.
The number is certainly the cause. The apparent disorder augments the grandeur, for the appearance of care is highly contrary to our ideas of magnificence. Besides, the stars lie in such apparent confusion, as makes it impossible on ordinary occasions to reckon them. This gives them the advantage of a sort of infinity.
Burke—On the Sublime and the Beautiful. Magnificence.
A grisly meteor on his face.
Butler—Cobbler and Vicar of Bray.
This hairy meteor did announce
The fall of sceptres and of crowns.
Butler—Hudibras. Pt. I. Canto I. 247.
Cry out upon the stars for doing
Ill offices, to cross their wooing.
Butler—Hudibras. Pt. III. Canto I. L. 17.
Like the lost pleiad seen no more below.
Byron—Beppo. St. 14.
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky.
Campbell—The Soldier’s Dream.
Where Andes, giant of the western star,
With meteor standard to the winds unfurl’d.
Campbell—Pleasures of Hope. Pt. I.
In yonder pensile orb, and every sphere
That gems the starry girdle of the year.
Campbell—Pleasures of Hope. Pt. II. L. 194.
Now twilight lets her curtain down
And pins it with a star.
Lydia Maria Child. Adapted from M’Donald Clark. Appeared thus in his obituary notice.
Quod est ante pedes nemo spectat: cœli scrutantur plagas.
No one sees what is before his feet: we all gaze at the stars.
Cicero—De Divinatione. II. 13.
While twilight’s curtain gathering far,
Is pinned with a single diamond star.
M’Donald Clark—Death in Disguise. L. 227.
Whilst twilight’s curtain spreading far,
Was pinned with a single star.
M’Donald Clark—Death in Disguise. L. 227. As it appeared in Boston Ed. 1833.
Hast thou a charm to stay the morning-star
In his steep course?
Coleridge—Hymn in the Vale of Chamouni.
Or soar aloft to be the spangled skies
And gaze upon her with a thousand eyes.
Coleridge—Lines on an Autumnal Evening.
All for Love, or the Lost Pleiad.
Stirling Coyne. Title of play. Produced in London, Jan. 16, 1838.
The stars that have most glory have no rest.
Samuel Daniel—History of the Civil War. Bk. VI. St. 104.
The stars are golden fruit upon a tree
All out of reach.
George Eliot—The Spanish Gypsy. Bk. II.
Hitch your wagon to a star.
Emerson—Society and Solitude. Civilization.
The starres, bright sentinels of the skies.
Wm. Habington—Dialogue between Night and Araphil. L. 3.
Why, who shall talk of shrines, of sceptres riven?
It is too sad to think on what we are,
When from its height afar
A world sinks thus; and yon majestic Heaven
Shines not the less for that one vanish’d star!
Felicia D. Hemans—The Lost Pleiad.
The starres of the night
Will lend thee their light,
Like tapers cleare without number.
Herrick—The Night Piece.
Micat inter omnes
Iulium sidus, velut inter ignes
Luna minores.
And yet more bright
Shines out the Julian star,
As moon outglows each lesser light.
Horace—Carmina. I. 12. 47.
The dawn is lonely for the sun,
And chill and drear;
The one lone star is pale and wan,
As one in fear.
Richard Hovey—Chanson de Rosemonde.
When, like an Emir of tyrannic power,
Sirius appears, and on the horizon black
Bids countless stars pursue their mighty track.
Victor Hugo—The Vanished City.
The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.
Job. XXXVIII. 7.
Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?
Job. XXXVIII. 31.
Canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons?
Job. XXXVIII. 32.
When sunset flows into golden glows,
And the breath of the night is new,
Love finds afar eve’s eager star—
That is my thought of you.
Robert Underwood Johnson—Star Song.
Who falls for love of God shall rise a star.
Jonson—Underwoods. 32. To a friend.
The stars in their courses fought against Sisera.
Judges. V. 20.
God be thanked for the Milky Way that runs across the sky.
That’s the path that my feet would tread whenever I have to die.
Some folks call it a Silver Sword, and some a Pearly Crown,
But the only thing I think it is, is Main Street, Heaventown.
Joyce Kilmer—Main Street.
The stars, heav’n sentry, wink and seem to die.
Lee—Theodosius. Probably inspired Campbell’s lines.
Just above yon sandy bar,
As the day grows fainter and dimmer,
Lonely and lovely, a single star
Lights the air with a dusky glimmer.
Longfellow—Chrysaor. St. 1.
Silently, one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven,
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels.
Longfellow—Evangeline. Pt. I. St. 3.
The night is calm and cloudless,
And still as still can be,
And the stars come forth to listen
To the music of the sea.
They gather, and gather, and gather,
Until they crowd the sky,
And listen, in breathless silence,
To the solemn litany.
Longfellow—Christus. The Golden Legend. Pt. V.
There is no light in earth or heaven
But the cold light of stars;
And the first watch of night is given
To the red planet Mars.
Longfellow—Light of Stars. St. 2.
Stars of the summer night!
Far in yon azure deeps
Hide, hide your golden light!
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps.
Longfellow—Spanish Student. Serenade.
A wise man,
Watching the stars pass across the sky,
Remarked:
In the upper air the fireflies move more slowly.
Amy Lowell—Meditation.
Wide are the meadows of night
And daisies are shining there,
Tossing their lovely dews,
Lustrous and fair;
And through these sweet fields go,
Wanderers amid the stars—
Venus, Mercury, Uranus, Neptune,
Saturn, Jupiter, Mars.
Walter De La Mare—The Wanderers.
The star that bids the shepherd fold,
Now the top of heaven doth hold.
Milton—Comus. L. 93.
So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed,
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky.
Milton—Lycidas. L. 168.
Brightest seraph, tell
In which of all these shining orbs hath man
His fixed seat, or fixed seat hath none,
But all these shining orbs his choice to dwell.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. III. L. 667.
At whose sight all the stars
Hide their diminish’d heads.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 34.
Now glowed the firmament
With living sapphires; Hesperus, that led
The starry host, rode brightest, till the Moon,
Rising in clouded majesty, at length
Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light,
And o’er the dark her silver mantle threw.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 604.
The starry cope
Of heaven.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 992.
And made the stars,
And set them in the firmament of heav’n,
T’ illuminate the earth, and rule the day
In their vicissitude, and rule the night.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. VII. L. 348.
Hither, as to their fountain, other stars
Repairing in their golden urns draw light,
And hence the morning planet gilds her horns.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. VII. L. 364.
A broad and ample road, whose dust is gold,
And pavement stars.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. VII. L. 577.
Now the bright morning-star, day’s harbinger,
Comes dancing from the east.
Milton—Song on May Morning.
Stars are the Daisies that begem
The blue fields of the sky,
Beheld by all, and everywhere,
Bright prototypes on high.
Moir—The Daisy. St. 5.
The quenchless stars, so eloquently bright,
Untroubled sentries of the shadow’y night.
Montgomery—Omnipresence of the Deity.
But soon, the prospect clearing,
By cloudless starlight on he treads
And thinks no lamp so cheering
As that light which Heaven sheds.
Moore—I’d Mourn the Hopes.
The stars stand sentinel by night.
John Norris.
And the day star arise in your hearts.
II. Peter I. 19.
Would that I were the heaven, that I might be
All full of love-lit eyes to gaze on thee.
Plato—To Stella. In Anthologia Palat. Vol. V. P. 317.
Led by the light of the Mæonian star.
Pope—Essay on Criticism. Pt. III. L. 89.
Ye little stars, hide your diminish’d rays.
Pope—Moral Essays. Ep. III. L. 282.
Starry Crowns of Heaven
Set in azure night!
Linger yet a little
Ere you hide your light:—
Nay; let Starlight fade away,
Heralding the day!
Adelaide A. Procter—Give Place.
No star is ever lost we once have seen,
We always may be what we might have been.
Adelaide A. Procter—Legend of Provence.
One naked star has waded through
The purple shallows of the night,
And faltering as falls the dew
It drips its misty light.
James Whitcomb Riley—The Beetle.
Thus some who have the Stars survey’d
Are ignorantly led
To think those glorious Lamps were made
To light Tom Fool to bed.
Nicholas Rowe—Song on a Fine Woman Who Had a Dull Husband.
Hesperus bringing together
All that the morning star scattered.—
Sappho. XIV. Trans. by Bliss Carman.
Her blue eyes sought the west afar,
For lovers love the western star.
Scott—Lay of the Last Minstrel. Canto III. St. 24.
Non est ad astra mollis e terris via.—
There is no easy way to the stars from the earth.
Seneca—Hercules Furens. Act II. 437. Same idea in Usener—Scholia. Lucan. I. 300. Prudentius—Cathem. 10. 92.
Our Jovial star reign’d at his birth.
Cymbeline. Act V. Sc. 4. L. 105.
Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere.
Henry IV. Pt. I. Act V. Sc. 4. L. 65.
The skies are painted with unnumber’d sparks,
They are all fire and every one doth shine,
But there’s but one in all doth hold his place.
Julius Cæsar. Act III. Sc. 1. L. 63.
The stars above us govern our conditions.
King Lear. Act IV. Sc. 3. L. 35.
The unfolding star calls up the shepherd.
Measure for Measure. Act IV. Sc. 2. L. 218.
Look how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:
There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-ey’d cherubins:
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
Merchant of Venice. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 58. (“Pattens” in Folio.)
These blessed candles of the night.
Merchant of Venice. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 220.
O that my spirit were yon heaven of night,
Which gazes on thee with its thousand eyes.
Shelley—Revolt of Islam. IV. 36.
He that strives to touch a star,
Oft stumbles at a straw.
Spenser—Shepherd’s Calendar. July.
Clamorem ad sidera mittunt.
They send their shout to the stars.
Statius—Thebais. XII. 521.
As shaking terrors from his blazing hair,
A sanguine comet gleams through dusky air.
Tasso—Jerusalem Delivered. Hoole’s trans. L. 581.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star!
How I wonder what you are,
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky!
Anne Taylor—Rhymes for the Nursery. The Star.
Each separate star
Seems nothing, but a myriad scattered stars
Break up the Night, and make it beautiful.
Bayard Taylor—Lars. Bk. III. Last lines.
The stars shall be rent into threds of light,
And scatter’d like the beards of comets.
Jeremy Taylor—Sermon I. Christ’s Advent to Judgment.
Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising thro’ the mellow shade,
Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid.
Tennyson—Locksley Hall. St. 5.
She saw the snowy poles and moons of Mars,
That marvellous field of drifted light
In mid Orion, and the married stars—
Tennyson—Palace of Art. Unfinished lines withdrawn from later editions. Appears in footnote to Ed. of 1833.
But who can count the stars of Heaven?
Who sing their influence on this lower world?
Thomson—Seasons. Winter. L. 528.
The twilight hours, like birds flew by,
As lightly and as free;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
Ten thousand on the sea.
For every wave with dimpled face
That leap’d upon the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace
And held it trembling there.
Amelia B. Welby—Musings. Twilight at Sea. St. 4.
But He is risen, a later star of dawn.
Wordsworth—A Morning Exercise.
You meaner beauties of the night,
That poorly satisfy our eyes
More by your number than your light;
You common people of the skies,—
What are you when the moon shall rise?
Sir Henry Wotton—On His Mistress, the Queen of Bohemia. (“Sun” in some editions.)
Hence Heaven looks down on earth with all her eyes.
Young—Night Thoughts. Night VII. L. 1,103.
One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine;
And light us deep into the Deity;
How boundless in magnificence and might.
Young—Night Thoughts. Night IX. L. 728.
Who rounded in his palm these spacious orbs
******
Numerous as gliterring gems of morning dew,
Or sparks from populous cities in a blaze,
And set the bosom of old night on fire.
Young—Night Thoughts. Night IX. L. 1,260.