Walt Whitman
The 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass, in order, little by little, over and over.
- Sure as the stars return again after they merge in the light, death is great as life.
- Great is death .... Sure as life holds all parts together, death holds all parts together;
- Great is life .. and real and mystical .. wherever and whoever,
- And there is another paradox.
- The eternal equilibrium of things is great, and the eternal overthrow of things is great,
- Do you call that a paradox? It certainly is a paradox.
- Great is wickedness .... I find I often admire it just as much as I admire goodness:
- I do not know what it is any more than I know what health is .... but I know it is great.
- Great is goodness;
- Before the perfect judge all shall stand back .... life and death shall stand back .... heaven and hell shall stand back.
- The perfect judge fears nothing .... he could go front to front before God,
- They rule on the highest grounds .... they oversee all eras and states and administrations,
- It is well assorted .... they have not studied for nothing ..... the great includes the less,
- For justice are the grand natural lawyers, and perfect judges .... it is in their souls,
- It is immutable .. it does not depend on majorities .... majorities or what not come at last before the same passionless and exact tribunal.
- It cannot be varied by statutes any more than love or pride or the attraction of gravity can,
- Justice is not settled by legislators and laws .... it is in the soul,
- Great is Justice;
- Great are marriage, commerce, newspapers, books, freetrade, railroads, steamers, international mails and telegraphs and exchanges.
- Great is the law .... Great are the old few landmarks of the law .... they are the same in all times and shall not be disturbed.
- The new rule shall rule as the soul rules, and as the love and justice and equality that are in the soul rule.
- It is the mother of the brood that must rule the earth with the new rule,
- Great is the English brood .... What brood has so vast a destiny as the English?
- Great is the English speech .... What speech is so great as the English?
- It is greater than wealth .... it is greater than buildings or ships or religions or paintings or music.
- It is the fulness and color and form and diversity of the earth .... and of men and women .... and of all qualities and processes;
- Great is language .... it is the mightiest of the sciences,
- Sound your voice! I scale mountains or dive in the sea after you.
- O truth of the earth! O truth of things! I am determined to press the whole way toward you,
- If there be equilibrium or volition there is truth .... if there be things at all upon the earth there is truth.
- If there be any soul there is truth .... if there be man or woman there is truth .... If there be physical or moral there is truth,
- The truth in man is no dictum .... it is vital as eyesight,
- It is inevitably in the man .... He and it are in love, and never leave each other.
- The quality of truth in man supports itself through all changes,
- Great is the quality of truth in man,
- Understand then that it goes as far onward from this as this is from the times when it lay in covering waters and gases.
- Do you imagine it is stopped at this? .... and the increase abandoned?
- Great is the earth, and the way it became what it is,
- Great is the greatest nation .. the nation of clusters of equal nations.
- That the true adoration is likewise without words and without kneeling.
- That anguish as hot as the hottest and contempt as cold as the coldest may be without words,
- Expression of speech .. in what is written or said forget not that silence is also expressive,
- Who goes for men and women showing poverty richer than wealth?
- But then the soul’s wealth – which is candor and knowledge and pride and enfolding love:
- Wealth with the flush hand and fine clothes and hospitality:
- The night follows close, with millions of suns, and sleep and restoring darkness.
- Day fullblown and splendid .... day of the immense sun, and action and ambition and laughter,
- Do you know that old age may come after you with equal grace and force and fascination?
- Youth large lusty and loving .... youth full of grace and force and fascination,
- Great is wealth and great is poverty .... great is expression and great is silence.