Oliver Wendell Holmes

Poet

1809-08-29 – 1894-10-07

Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. was an American physician, poet, and essayist associated with the Fireside Poets. He is known for poems such as Old Ironsides and for influential prose writing.

Books by Oliver Wendell Holmes

The Collected Legal Papers
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The Common Law
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Collected Legal Papers
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Quotes by Oliver Wendell Holmes

A mind stretched by a new ideanever shrinks back to its original proportions. ~
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A mind stretched by a new ideanever shrinks back to its original proportions. ~
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Don't you stay at home of evenings? Don't you love a cushioned seat in a corner, by the fireside, with your slippers on your feet?
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The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.
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Do not be bullied out of your common sense by the specialist; two to one, he is a pedant.
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I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving: To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it - but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.
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Most people are willing to take the Sermon on the Mount as a flag to sail under, but few will use it as a rudder by which to steer.
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Memory is a net: one finds it full of fish when he takes it from the brook, but a dozen miles of water have run through it without sticking.
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Stillness of person and steadiness of features are signal marks of good breeding.
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Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions.
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A few can touch the magic string, and noisy fame is proud to win them: Alas for those that never sing, but die with all their music in them!
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But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.
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Don't flatter yourselves that friendship authorizes you to say disagreeable things to your intimates. On the contrary, the nearer you come into relation with a person, the more necessary do tact and courtesy become.
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Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if he has common sense on the ground-floor. But if a man hasn't got plenty of good common sense, the more science he has, the worse for his patient.
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A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide.
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Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness, of hatred, of jealousy, and, most easily of all, the gate of fear.
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To reach a port we must sail, sometimes with the wind, and sometimes against it. But we must not drift or lie at anchor.
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Controversy equalizes fools and wise men in the same way - and the fools know it.
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It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living.
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The young man knows the rules, but the old man knows the exceptions.
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