Top 100 Whither Quotes
#1. There must be a new world if there is to be any world at all! ... These days of universal death must be days of universal new birth, if the ruin is not to be total and final! It is Time to make the dullest man consider; and ask himself, Whence he came? Whither he is bound?
Thomas Carlyle
#3. When I discovered a new plant, I sat down beside it for a minute or a day, to make its acquaintance and hear what it had to tell ... I asked the boulders I met, whence they came and whither they were going.
John Muir
#4. Whither thou know'est thy ass from thy elbow
J.R. Ward
#5. Ah, whither shall a maiden flee, When a bold youth so swift pursues, And siege of tenderest courtesy, With hope perseverant, still renews!
Coventry Patmore
#6. Whence come I and whither go I? That is the great unfathomable question, the same for every one of us. Science has no answer to it.
Max Planck
#7. My advice to you is not to inquire why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it is on your plate.
Thornton Wilder
#8. Knowledge of ourselves teaches us whence we come, where we are and whither we are going. We come from God and we are in exile; and it is because our potency of affection lends towards God that we are aware of this state of exile.
John Of Ruysbroeck
#9. a new chill from afar out whither the condor had flown, as if my flesh had caught a horror before my eyes had seen it. Nor
H.P. Lovecraft
#10. Youth, like a magic bird, has flown away
He sang a little morning-hour in May
Sang to the rose, his love, that too is gone
Whither is more than you or I can say.
Omar Khayyam
#11. Now whither does THIS trail lead?" Kaa's voice was gentler. "Not a moon since there was a Manling with a knife threw stones at my head and called me bad little tree-cat names, because I lay asleep in the open.
Rudyard Kipling
#12. Like flowers we grow, bloom, and whither - each day and each life. In our next life we'll grow, bloom, and whither even more beautifully. But although we blossom more grandiose in each new life, all our lives are perfect in their own way.
Stefan Emunds
#13. When I go out of the house for a walk, uncertain as yet whither I will bend my steps, [I] submit myself to my instinct to decide for me.
Henry David Thoreau
#14. What is it that makes it so hard sometimes to determine whither we will walk? I believe that there is a subtle magnetism in Nature, which, if we unconsciously yield to it, will direct us aright.
Henry David Thoreau
#15. Comes over one an absolute necessity to move. And what is more, to move in some particular direction. A double necessity then: to get on the move, and to know whither.
D.H. Lawrence
#16. We call that fire of the black thunder-cloud "electricity," and lecture learnedly about it, and grind the like of it out of glass and silk: but what is it? What made it? Whence comes it? Whither goes it?
Thomas Carlyle
#17. And so it was I entered the broken world
To trace the visionary company of love, its voice
An instant in the wind (I know not whither hurled)
But not for long to hold each desperate choice.
Hart Crane
#18. Whither should I fly? I have done no harm. But I remember now (70) I am in this earthly world, where to do harm Is often laudable, to do good sometime
William Shakespeare
#19. A blossom full of promise is life's joy,
That never comes to fruit. Hope, for a time,
Suns the young floweret in its gladsome light,
And it looks flourishing
a little while
'T is pass'd, we know not whither, but 't is gone.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
#20. A man never rises so high as when he knows not whither he is going. The desire to eliminate uncertainty eliminates life.
William Deresiewicz
#21. Whither do I call Thee, since I am in Thee? or whence canst Thou enter into
Augustine Of Hippo
#22. As rivers, the nearer they come to the ocean whither they tend, the more they increase their waters, and speed their streams; so will grace flow more fully and freely in its near approaches to the ocean of glory.
John Owen
#23. By becoming aware of the dignity of the mind, we realize the true ground of the dignity of man and therewith the goodness of the world, whither we understand it as created or uncreated, which is the home of man because it is the home of the human mind.
Leo Strauss
#24. There is hook in every benefit, that sticks in his jaws that takes that benefit, and draws him whither the benefactor will.
John Donne
#25. Quo Fas et Gloria Ducunt (Whither right and glory lead)
Elizabeth II
#26. God is not a being among other beings, but the infinite Whither that makes possible the very functioning of our human spirit.
Elizabeth A. Johnson
#27. We mourn the blossoms of May because they are to whither; but we know that May is one day to have its revenge upon November, by the revolution of that solemn circle which never stops
which teaches us in our height of hope, ever to be sober, and in our depth of desolation, never to despair.
William Peter Blatty
#28. There is no such thing as a true tale. Truth has many faces and the truth is like to the old road to Avalon; it depends on your own will, and your own thoughts, whither the road will take you.
Marion Zimmer Bradley
#29. One lies there," I thought, "who will soon be beyond the war of earthly elements. Whither will that spirit -- now struggling to quit its material tenement -- flit when at length released?
Charlotte Bronte
#30. You don't have to do this."
"I think I do," Julian said. "I remember making a vow to that affect."
"Whither thou goest, i will go, whatever stupid thing you do, i shall do also'." Emma said. "Was that the vow?
Cassandra Clare
#31. Who knows whence he comes, where he is, and whither he tends, he, and he alone, is wise.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
#32. We see the most beautiful creations whither. The beautiful young maiden becomes the old woman and she hates her body because it isn't what it used to be. The young man becomes the old dotard who has trouble remembering.
Frederick Lenz
#33. The world turns aside to let any man pass who knows whither he is going.
David Starr Jordan
#34. So true is this that if we do not respond to the demands of the present, because we do not know in advance whither we may be led, we are simply refusing to hear the call of Jesus Christ. We are refusing to open to him when he knocks on the door and invites us to sup with him.
Gustavo Gutierrez
#35. No one rises so high as he who knows not whither he is going.
Oliver Cromwell
#36. If Romney explains why where we are with Obama is unacceptable, why whither we are tending is even worse - and why his own alternative path forward is superior - then we trust the American people to make the right choice in November.
Bill Kristol
#37. If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.
Abraham Lincoln
#38. Let us follow the truth whither so ever it leads.
Socrates
#39. ..you are retained as counsel for unhappy mankind. You have promised to help those in peril by sea, those in captivity, the sick and the needy, and those whose heads are under the poised axe. Whither are you straying? What are you doing?
Seneca.
#40. I forced my way to the brink, stepped into the boat, pushed it, with the help of the tree-branches, out into the stream, lay down in the bottom, and let my boat and me float whither the stream would carry us.
George MacDonald
#41. Little, indeed, does it concern us in this our mortal stage, to inquire whence the spirit hath come; but of what infinite concern is the consideration whither it is going. Surely such consideration demands the study of a life.
Robert Southey
#42. The human mind has to ask "Who, what, whence, whither, why am I?" And it is very doubtful if the human mind can answer any of these questions.
R.D. Laing
#43. The tops of mountains are among the unfinished parts of the globe, whither it is a slight insult to the gods to climb and pry into their secrets, and try their effect on our humanity. Only daring and insolent men, perchance, go there.
Henry David Thoreau
#44. Good historians, I suspect, whether they think about it or not, have the future in their bones. Besides the question: Why? the historian also asks the question: Whither?
Edward Hallett Carr
#45. Rivers are roads that move and carry us whither we wish to go.
[Fr., Les rivieres sont des chemins qui marchant et qui portent ou l'on veut aller.]
Blaise Pascal
#46. It hath evermore been the notorious badge of prostituted Strumpets and the lewdest Harlots, to ramble abroad to Plays, to Playhouses; whither no honest, chaste or sober Girls or Women, but only branded Whores and infamous Adulteresses, did usually resort in ancient times.
William Prynne
#47. The regenerating Spirit is compared to the wind. His first attempts on the soul may be so secret that the creature knows not whence they come, or whither they tend; but, before he hath done, the sound will be heard throughout the soul.
William Gurnall
#48. Those who fall in love with practice without science are like a sailor who enters a ship without a helm or a compass, and who never can be certain whither he is going.
Leonardo Da Vinci
#50. I depart, Whither I know not; but the hour's gone by When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad mine eye.
Lord Byron
#51. The man with the knapsack is never lost. No matter whither he may stray, his food and shelter are right with him, and home is wherever he may choose to stop.
Horace Kephart
#52. For whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou longest, i will lodge; thy people will be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried. The Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me.
Sue Monk Kidd
#53. Needy knife-grinder! whither are ye going? Rough is the road, your wheel is out of order; Bleak blows the blast-your hat has got a hole in it. So have your breeches.
George Canning
#54. Whither, O god of wine, art thou hurrying me, whilst under thy all-powerful influence?
Horace
#55. Whither will my path yet lead me? This path is stupid, it goes in spirals, perhaps in circles, but whichever way it goes, I will follow it.
Hermann Hesse
#56. Degraded bird, I give you back your eyes forever, ascend now whither you are tossed;
Forsake this wrist, forsake this rhyme;
Soar, eat ether, see what has never been seen; depart, be lost,
But climb.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
#57. Into this Universe, and why not knowing,
Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing;
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing.
Omar Khayyam
#58. A man never rises higher than when he does not know whither his path can still lead him.
Oliver Cromwell
#59. Whither am I going? To the New World. What to do? To gain honor? No, if I know my own heart. To get money? No: I am going to live to God, and to bring others so to do.
Francis Asbury
#60. No one questioned the Machine's powers. Religion had been re-established with the Machine as the Supreme Being. Everyone yielded to 'some invincible pressure, which came no one knew whither, and which, when gratified, was succeeded by some new pressure equally invincible.
John N. Gray
#61. And who in time knows whither we may vent the treasure of our tongue, to what strange shores this gain of our best glories shall be sent, 't unknowing Nations with our stores? What worlds in the yet unformed Occident may come refined with the accents that are ours?
Samuel Daniel
#62. Abraham did not know where he was going immediately, but he knew where he was going ultimately. He did not know the Whither but he knew the Whom. He believed God, and, being sure of his destiny, he did not worry about his destination.
Vance Havner
#63. No man need go blindly to destruction, for God has given him guidance and power of seeing whither he goes.
Sabine Baring-Gould
#64. Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car at night?
Jack Kerouac
#65. Whither away, Bluebird, Whither away? The blast is chill, yet in the upper sky Thou still canst find the color of thy wing, The hue of May. Warbler, why speed, thy southern flight? ah, why, Thou, too, whose song first told us of the Spring? Whither away?
Edmund Clarence Stedman
#66. Where was my heart to flee for refuge from my heart? Whither was I to fly, where I would not follow? In what place should I not be prey to myself?
Saint Augustine
#67. Whither depart the souls of the brave that die in the battle, Die in the lost, lost fight, for the cause that perishes with them?
Arthur Hugh Clough
#68. Every cradle asks us, Whence? and every coffin, Whither? The poor barbarian, weeping above his dead, can answer these questions as intelligently as the robed priest of the most authentic creed.
Robert Green Ingersoll
#69. A breeze passes in the night. When did it spring up? Whence does it come? Whither is it going? No man knows.
Pierre Teilhard De Chardin
#70. I don't know whither we are drifting, but I do know where every real thinking patriot will stand in the end, and that's by the Constitution.
William Howard Taft
#71. Few can foresee whither their road will lead them, till they come to its end.
J.R.R. Tolkien
#72. Whither thou goest, I will go;
Where thou diest, will I die
And there will I be buried:
The Angel do so to me, and more also,
If aught but death part thee and me.
Cassandra Clare
#73. this saying of Ecclesiastes: "Who knoweth whither the soul of the animal goeth?
Victor Hugo
#74. But whither am I strayed? I need not raise Trophies to thee from other men's dispraise; Nor is thy fame on lesser ruins built; Nor needs thy juster title the foul guilt Of Eastern kings, who, to secure their reign, Must have their brothers, sons, and kindred slain.
John Denham
#75. This characteristic of Dasein's being this "that it is" is veiled in its "whence" and "whither.
Martin Heidegger
#76. Nature has unlimited time in which to travel along tortuous paths to an unknown destination. The mind of man is too feeble to discern whence or whither the path runs and has to be content if it can discern only portions of the track, however small.
Karl Von Frisch
#77. A woman with her two children was captured on the steps of the capitol building, whither she had fled for protection, and this, too, while the stars and stripes floated over it.
Jane Swisshelm
#78. Rivers are roads which move, and which carry us whither we desire to go.
Blaise Pascal
#79. Speech is as a pump, by which we raise and pour out the water from the great lake of Thought,
whither it flows back again.
John Sterling
#80. People who don't cherish their elderly have forgotten whence they came and whither they go.
Ramsey Clark
#81. Paradise is a center whither the souls of all men are proceeding, each sect in its particular road.
Napoleon Bonaparte
#82. What am I to do on this earth? The choice rests with me: suffer or enjoy. Whither will suffering lead me? To nothingness; but I shall have suffered. Whither will enjoyment lead me? To nothingness; but I will have enjoyed myself.
Victor Hugo
#83. Whither is fled the visionary gleam? Where is it now, the glory and the dream?
William Wordsworth
#84. But whoever is a genuine follower of Truth, keeps his eye steady upon his guide, indifferent whither he is led, provided that she is the leader.
Edmund Burke
#85. But alas! my Lord, what is blood! what is nobility! We are all reptiles, miserable, sinful creatures. It is piety alone that can distinguish us from the dust whence we sprung, and whither we must return.
Horace Walpole
#86. Down from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone, And I must follow, if I can, Pursuing it with weary feet, Until it joins some larger way, Where many paths and errands meet. And whither then? I cannot say.
J.R.R. Tolkien
#87. I had often stood on the banks of the Concord, watching the lapse of the current, an emblem of all progress, following the same law with the system, with time, and all that is madeand at last I resolved to launch myself on its bosom and float whither it would bear me.
Henry David Thoreau
#88. Like the winds that we come we know not whence and blow whither soever they list, the forces of society are derived from an obscure and distant origin. They arise before the date of philosophy, from the instincts, not the speculations of men.
Adam Ferguson
#89. Whither will suffering lead me? To nothingness; but I shall have suffered. Whither will enjoyment lead me? To nothingness; but I shall have enjoyed myself.
Victor Hugo
#90. Ecclesiastes 9:10 Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave whither you go.
Ray Looker
#91. She was ready to be a fugitive with him for the rest of her life - 'Whither thou goest, I will go; thy people shall be my people' - and when a Parisienne is ready to leave Paris behind forever, that's something. ("I'm Dangerous Tonight")
Cornell Woolrich
#92. The things we now esteem fixed shall, one by one, detach themselves, like ripe fruit, from our experience, and fall. The wind shall blow them none knows whither.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
#94. Descending, I went wandering whither chance might lead, in a still ecstasy of freedom and enjoyment; and I got - I know not how - I got into the heart of city life.
Charlotte Bronte
#96. Rivers are highways that move on and bear us whither we wish to go.
Blaise Pascal
#97. A man never goes so far as when he does not know whither he is going.
Oliver Cromwell
#98. This Life is a fleeting breath, And whither and how shall I go, When I wander away with Death By a path that I do not know.
Louise Chandler Moulton
#99. Could the best and kindest of us who depart from the earth have an opportunity of revisiting it, I suppose he or she (assuming that any Vanity Fair feelings subsist in the sphere whither we are bound) would have a pang of mortification at finding how soon our survivors were consoled.
William Makepeace Thackeray
#100. A perfect piece of architecture kindles that aimless reverie, which bears the soul we know not whither.
Madame De Stael
