"A democrat by conviction rather than by temperament, urging democracy as 'the only method consistent with human instinct toward expansion,' he was yet an educator, and believed in equality upon a high, not upon a low plane. Like Ruskin, he demanded of men their best, and with less than their best refused to be satisfied."

“Of all the arts poetry is the most intimate and personal.”

“Poetry belongs to the real things—to the realm of the ideal which is "the only real.”

“poetry, which is the voice of the soul's aspirations, has for it, of all the arts, the most natural and immediate appeal.”

“poetry needed no renascence. It was not young, it is not old.”

“She was a great woman with the heart of a little child. Her works praise her; the millions of God's creatures whom she has saved from suffering sing her praise. Where she has gone the recognition of this world counts for little. She has gone where the merciful are blessed, where the pure in heart see God.”

“Many modern poets seem to think that poetry should be sensual. It should not—it should be sensuous.”