Dinah Craik

“Did George Eliot say this? - On quotations of Craik commonly misattributed to George Eliot”

“Selected poetry at the University of Toronto”

“Works of Craik at the Victorian Women Writers Project, University of Indiana”

“Dinah Mulock Craik by Sally Mitchell, a detailed account of her life and works at The Victora Web.”

“Dinah Craik at the Literary Encyclopedia”

“Dinah Craik at "Literary Heritage".”

“A vision without a task is but a dream. A task without vision is but drudgery. A vision with a task is the hope of the world.”

“Drink, my jolly lads, drink with discerning, Wedlock's a lane where there is no turning; Never was owl more blind than a lover, Drink and be merry, lads, half seas over.”

“And all day long, so close and near, As in a mystic dream I hearTheir gentle accents kind and dear —  The old familiar voices. They have no sound that I can reach — But silence sweeter is than speech.”

“Down in the deep, up in the sky, I see them always, far or nigh, And I shall see them till I die —  The old familiar faces.”

“O, my son's my son till he gets him a wife, But my daughter's my daughter all her life.”

“There never was night that had no morn.”

“   Awakener, come! Fling wide the gate of an eternal year, The April of that glad new heavens and earth Which shall grow out of these, as spring-tide grows Slow out of winter's breast.    Let Thy wide hand Gather us all — with none left out (O God! Leave Thou out none!) from the east and from the west. Loose Thou our burdens: heal our sicknesses; Give us one heart, one tongue, one faith, one love. In Thy great Oneness made complete and strong — To do Thy work throughout the happy world — Thy world, All-merciful — Thy perfect world.”

“The irrevocable Hand That opes the year's fair gate, doth ope and shut The portals of our earthly destinies; We walk through blindfold, and the noiseless doors Close after us, for ever.{{pb}}Pause, my soul, On these strange words — for ever — whose large sound Breaks flood-like, drowning all the petty noise Our human moans make on the shores of Time. O Thou that openest, and no man shuts; That shut'st, and no man opens — Thee we wait!”

“Sweet April-time — O cruel April-time! Year after year returning, with a brow Of promise, and red lips with longing paled, And backward-hidden hands that clutch the joys Of vanished springs, like flowers.”

“Nothing but a speck we seem In the waste of waters round, Floating, floating like a dream, — Outward bound.”

“All that we know of Thee, or knowing not Love only, waiting till the perfect time When we shall know even as we are known;— O Thou Child Jesus, Thou dost seem to say By the soft silence of these heavenly eyes (That rose out of the depths of nothingness Upon this limner's reverent soul and hand) We too should be about our father's business — O Christ, hear us!”

“This, this is Thou. No idle painter's dream Of aureoled, imaginary Christ, Laden with attributes that make not God; But Jesus, son of Mary; lowly, wise, Obedient, subject unto parents, mild, Meek — as the meek that shall inherit earth, Pure — as the pure in heart that shall see God.{{pb}}O infinitely human, yet divine! Half clinging childlike to the mother found,Yet half repelling — as the soft eyes say, "How is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not That I must be about my Father's business?"”

“God rest ye, little children; let nothing you afright,For Jesus Christ, your Saviour, was born this happy night;Along the hills of Galilee the white flocks sleeping lay,When Christ, the child of Nazareth, was born on Christmas day.”

“One cannot make oneself, but one can sometimes help a little in the making of somebody else.”