Dire Straits Mark

Famous quotes containing the words dire, straits and/or mark:

“What dire offence from am’rous causes springs,
What mighty contests rise from trivial things,
I sing—”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)

“Yes! in sea of life enisled,
With echoing straits between us thrown,
Dotting the shoreless watery wild,
We mortal millions live alone.”
—Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)

“But the mark of American merit in painting, in sculpture, in poetry, in fiction, in eloquence, seems to be a certain grace without grandeur, and itself not new but derivative; a vase of fair outline, but empty,—which whoso sees, may fill with what wit and character is in him, but which does not, like the charged cloud, overflow with terrible beauty, and emit lightnings on all beholders.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)