So long as we think of it objectively, time is Fate or Chance, the factor in our lives for which we are not responsible, and about which we can do nothing; but when we begin to think of it subjectively, we feel responsible for our time, and the notion of punctuality arises.
— W.H. Auden The Complete Works of W.H. Auden: Prose
Tags: time, objective-and-subjective

Other Quotes by "W.H. Auden"

Funeral Blues Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone, Silence the pianos and with muffled drum Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come. Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead, Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves, Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves. He was my North, my South, my East and West, My working week and my Sunday rest, My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song; I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong. The stars are not wanted now; put out every one, Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun; Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood; For nothing now can ever come to any good.
Tags: poetry, poem, mourning, love, loss, grief, death
Without art, we should have no notion of the sacred; without science, we should always worship false gods.
Tags: worship, science, sacred, art
The true men of action in our time those who transform the world are not the politicians and statesmen but the scientists. Unfortunately poetry cannot celebrate them because their deeds are concerned with things, not persons, and are therefore speechless. When I find myself in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a drawing room full of dukes.
Tags: science
Let not Time deceive you, You cannot conquer Time.
Tags: time, naivite, mortality
In headaches and in worry Vaguely life leaks away, And Time will have his fancy To-morrow or to-day.
Tags: time, poetry, life
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