Listen to the Water-Mill:
Through the live-long day
How the clicking of its wheel
Wears the hours away!
Languidly the Autumn wind
Stirs the forest leaves,
From the field the reapers sing
Binding up their sheaves:
And a proverb haunts my mind
As a spell is cast,
"The mill cannot grind
With the water that is past."
You May Also Like / View all maxioms
We can draw lessons from the past, but we cannot live in it.
We can draw lessons from the past, but we cannot live in it.
The next day is never so good as the day before.
The next day is never so good as the day before.
Man... cannot learn to forget, but hangs on the past: however far or fast he runs, that chain runs with read more
Man... cannot learn to forget, but hangs on the past: however far or fast he runs, that chain runs with him.
The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.
The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.
I cannot sing the old songs, Or dream those dreams again,
I cannot sing the old songs, Or dream those dreams again,
The past always looks better than it was; it's only pleasant because it isn't here.
The past always looks better than it was; it's only pleasant because it isn't here.
O, to bring back the great Homeric time,
The simple manners and the deed sublime:
When the read more
O, to bring back the great Homeric time,
The simple manners and the deed sublime:
When the wise Wanderer, often foiled by Fate,
Through the long furrow drave the ploughshare straight.
You have to know the past to understand the present.
You have to know the past to understand the present.
O God! Put back Thy universe and give me yesterday.
O God! Put back Thy universe and give me yesterday.
