“You are the music while the music lasts.”
Music
“The last thing one discovers in composing a work is what to put first.”
WorkAll Quotes by T. S. Eliot
“A toothache, or a violent passion, is not necessarily diminished by our knowledge of its causes, its character, its importance or insignificance.”
Knowledge“Every experience is a paradox in that it means to be absolute, and yet is relative in that it somehow always goes beyond itself and yet never escapes itself.”
Experience“There is no method but to be very intelligent.”
Intelligence“Home is where one starts from.”
Home“The communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.”
Communication“Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
Knowledge“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
Time“A play should give you something to think about. When I see a play and understand it the first time, then I know it can't be much good.”
Good“We know too much, and are convinced of too little. Our literature is a substitute for religion, and so is our religion.”
Religion“Moving between the legs of tables and of chairs, rising or falling, grasping at kisses and toys, advancing boldly, sudden to take alarm, retreating to the corner of arm and knee, eager to be reassured, taking pleasure in the fragrant brilliance of the Christmas tree.”
Christmas“Business today consists in persuading crowds.”
Business“Poetry should help, not only to refine the language of the time, but to prevent it from changing too rapidly.”
Poetry“As things are, and as fundamentally they must always be, poetry is not a career, but a mug's game. No honest poet can ever feel quite sure of the permanent value of what he has written: He may have wasted his time and messed up his life for nothing.”
Poetry“Knowledge is invariably a matter of degree: you cannot put your finger upon even the simplest datum and say this we know.”
Graduation“For love would be love of the wrong thing there is yet faith, But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.”
Faith“Art never improves, but... the material of art is never quite the same.”
Art“I am an Anglo-Catholic in religion, a classicist in literature and a royalist in politics.”
Politics“Television is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.”
Time“Where is all the knowledge we lost with information?”
Knowledge