Walt Whitman Quotes That Will Inspire You to Live Your Best Life

1. I am larger, better than I thought; I did not know I held so much goodness.All seems beautiful to me.Whoever denies me, it shall not trouble me; Whoever accepts me, he or she shall be blessed, and shall bless me. Leaves of Grass

2. I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,Regardless of others, ever regardful of others,Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man,Stuffed with the stuff that is course, and stuffed with the stuff that is fine, one of the nation, of many nations, the smallest the same and the the largest Song of Myself

3. re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.[From the preface to Leaves Grass] Leaves of Grass

4. Re-examine all you have been told. Dismiss what insults your soul.

5. Some people are so much sunshine to the square inch.

6. The road to wisdom is paved with excess. The mark of a true writer is their ability to mystify the familiar and familiarize the strange.

7. TO the States or any one of them, or any city of the States, Resist much, obey little, Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved,Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth, ever after-ward resumes its liberty. Leaves of Grass

8. Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.

9. --> This is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless,Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson    done,Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the    themes thou lovest best,Night, sleep, death and the stars. — A Clear Midnight, Leaves of Grass. Originally published: July 4, 1855. Leaves of Grass

10. Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road.Healthy, free, the world before me.The long brown path before me leading me wherever I choose.Henceforth, I ask not good fortune, I myself am good fortune.Henceforth, I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing. Songs for the Open Road: Poems of Travel and Adventure

11. And I or you pocketless of a dime, may purchase the pick of the earth. Song of Myself

12. For we cannot tarry here,We must march my darlings, we must bear the brunt of danger,We, the youthful sinewy races, all the rest on us depend, Pioneers! O pioneers! Leaves of Grass

13. Here the frailest leaves of me and yet my strongest lasting, Here I shade and hide my thoughts, I myself do not expose them, And yet they expose me more than all my other poems

14. I act as the tongue of you,... tied in your mouth . . . . in mine it begins to be loosened.

15. I celebrate myself, and sing myself, And what I assume you shall assume,For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. Leaves of Grass

16. I discover myself on the verge of a usual mistake. Song of Myself

17. I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world. Leaves of Grass

18. If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles. Leaves of Grass

19. Note, to-day, an instructive, curious spectacle and conflict. Science, (twin, in its fields, of Democracy in its)—Science, testing absolutely all thoughts, all works, has already burst well upon the world—a sun, mounting, most illuminating, most glorious—surely never again to set. But against it, deeply entrench'd, holding possession, yet remains, (not only through the churches and schools, but by imaginative literature, and unregenerate poetry,) the fossil theology of the mythic-materialistic, superstitious, untaught and credulous, fable-loving, primitive ages of humanity. Complete Prose Works

20. O Me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish; Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?) Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d; Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me; Of the empty and useless years of the rest—with the rest me intertwined; The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life? Answer.That you are here—that life exists, and identity; That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse. Leaves of Grass

21. O the joy of my spirit--it is uncaged--it darts like lightning!It is not enough to have this globe or a certain time,I will have thousands of globes and all time.

22. Of Equality--as if it harm'd me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself--as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same. Leaves of Grass

23. Peace is always beautiful. Leaves of Grass

24. Poets to ComePOETS to come! orators, singers, musicians to come!Not to-day is to justify me, and answer what I am for;But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than before known,Arouse! Arousefor you must justify meyou must answer.I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future,I but advance a moment, only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness.I am a man who, sauntering along, without fully stopping, turns a casual look upon you, and then averts his face,Leaving it to you to prove and define it,Expecting the main things from you.

25. Resist much, obey little. Leaves of Grass

26. Sometimes with one I love, I fill myself with rage, for fear I effuse unreturn'd love; But now I think there is no unreturn'd love—the pay is certain, one way or another; (I loved a certain person ardently, and my love was not return'd; Yet out of that, I have written these songs.)

27. Song of MyselfI have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the beginning and the end, But I do not talk of the beginning or the end. There was never any more inception than there is now, Nor any more youth or age than there is now, And will never be any more perfection than there is now, Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

28. Song of myselfSmile O voluptuous cool-breath'd earth! Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees! Earth of departed sunset--earth of the mountains misty-topt! Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue! Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river! Earth of the limpid gray of clouds brighter and clearer for my sake! Far-swooping elbow'd earth--rich apple-blossom'd earth! Smile, for your lover comes.

29. Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,You shall possess the good of the earth and sun.... there are millions of suns left,You shall no longer take things at second or third hand.... nor look through the eyes of the dead.... nor feed on the spectres in books,You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,You shall listen to all sides and filter them from yourself. Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition

30. The press of my foot to the earth springs a hundred affections,They scorn the best I can do to relate them. Song of Myself