stranger

A Stranger here Strange things doth meet, strange glories see; StrangeTreasures lodg'd in this fair world appear, Strange all, and New to me, But that they mine should be, who nothing was, That Strangest is of all, yet brought to pass.

—Traherne,Thomas

The ultimate indignity is to be given a bedpan by a stranger who calls you by your first name.

—Kuhn, Maggie

Let Erin remember the days of Old, Ere her faithless sons betrayed her; When Malachi wore the collar of gold Which he won from her proud invader; When her kings, with standards of green unfurled, Led the Red-Branch Knights to danger; Ere the emerald gem of the western world Was set in the crown of a stranger.

—Moore,Thomas

When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that the L thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands.

—Bible (Old Testament)

One would be in less danger From the wiles of a stranger If one's own kin and kith Were more fun to be with.

—Nash, (Frederic) Ogden

Weary men, what reap ye?öGolden corn for the stranger. What sow ye?öHuman corpses that wait for the avenger. Fainting forms, hunger stricken, what see ye in the offing? Stately ships to bear our food away, amid the stranger's scoffing. There's a proud array of soldiersöwhat do they round your door? They guard our master'sgranaries from the thin hands of the poor. Pale mothers, wherefore weeping? Would to God that we were deadö Ourchildren swoon before us, and we cannot give them bread.

—Wilde,Jane Francesca ne¤  e Elgee

Go, stranger, and tell the Spartans that here we lie, obedient to their commands.

—Simonides of Ceos

And how am I to face the odds Of man's bedevilment and God's? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.

—Housman, A(lfred) E(dward)

Estrangeiro aqui como em toda a parte. I'm a stranger here, as I am everywhere.

—Pessoa, Fernando Anto¤  nio Nogueira

And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. And I will give untothee, and tothy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God† Every man child among you shall be circumcised.

—Bible (Old Testament)

   Part of knowing who we are is knowing we are not someone else. And Jew is only the name we give to that stranger, the agony we cannot feel, the death we look at like a cold abstraction. Each man has his Jew; it is the other.

—Miller, Arthur

Call no man foe, but never love a stranger.

—Benson, Stella

Non ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco. No stranger totrouble myself,Iam learning to help those who are in distress.

—Virgil full name Publius Vergilius Maro

For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and yegaveme drink: Iwas a stranger, and yetook me in: Naked,and ye clothedme: Iwassick, and yevisited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

—Bible (NewTestament)

Stranger, pause and ask thyself the question,Canst thou do likewise? If not, with a blush retire.

—Dickens, CharlesJohn Huffam

The Swiss are inspired hotel-keepers. Some centuries since, when thestranger strayed into one oftheir valleys, their simple forefathers would kill him and share out the little money he might have about him. Now they know better. They keep him alive and writing cheques.

—Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley ne¤  e Pierrepoint

And God spake all these words, saying,Iamthe L thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that isinheaven above, or that isin the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the L thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. Thoushalt nottakethename of the L thy God invain; for the L will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Remember thesabbath day, to keep it holy. Six daysthou shalt labour and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the L thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the L made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the L blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long uponthelandwhichtheL thy Godgiveththee. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

—Bible (Old Testament)

From this day you must be a stranger to one of your parents.öYourmother will never seeyouagainif youdo not marry Mr Collins,and Iwill never seeyouagainif you do.

—Austen,Jane

Some thirty inches from my nose The frontier of my Person goes, And all the untilled air between Is private pagus or demesne. Stranger, unless with bedroom eyes I beckon you to fraternize, Beware of rudely crossing it: I have no gun, but I can spit.

—Auden,W(ystan) H(ugh)

He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it: and he that hateth suretiship is sure.

—Bible (Old Testament)

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which ourdull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive formsöthis knowledge, this feeling, isatthe centerof true religiousness.In thissense, and in this sense only, I belong to the rank of devoutly religious men.

—Einstein, Albert

For nature, heartless, witless nature, Will neither care nor know What stranger's feet may find the meadow And trespass there and go, Nor ask amid the dews of morning If they are mine or no.

—Housman, A(lfred) E(dward)

The aimof everyartist istoarrest motion, which islife, by artificial means and hold it fixed so that a hundred years later, when a stranger looks at it, it moves again since it is life.

—Faulkner,William Harrison

Who is the smiling stranger With hair as white as gin, What is he doing with the children And who could have let him in?

—Causley, Charles

Home is where one starts from. As we grow older The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated Of dead and living.

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)