You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write.
—Saul Bellow (1915–2005) Canadian-American Novelist
Never greet a stranger in the night, for he may be a demon.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
This sacred shade and solitude, what is it?—It is the felt presence of the Deity.—Few are the faults we flatter when alone; vice sinks in her allurements, in ungilt, and looks, like other objects, black by night.—By night an atheist half believes a God.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
Night, like a giant, fills the church, from pavement to roof, and holds dominion through the silent hours. Pale dawn again comes peeping through the windows: and, giving place to day, sees night withdraw into the vaults, and follows it, and drives it out, and hides among the dead.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
Twilight drops her curtain down, and pins it with a star.
—Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874–1942) Canadian Novelist
The day is for honest men, the night for thieves.
—Euripides (480–406 BCE) Ancient Greek Dramatist
For the happiest life, rigorously plan your days, leave your nights open to chance.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
Why does the evening, why does the night, put warmer love in our hearts?—Is it the nightly pressure of helplessness?—Or is it the exalting separation from the turmoils of life, that veiling of the world in which, for the soul, nothing remains but souls?
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
Shadow owes its birth to light.
—John Gay (1685–1732) English Poet, Dramatist
Quiet night, that brings rest to the laborer, is the outlaw’s day, in which he rises early to do wrong, and when his work is ended, dares not sleep.
—Philip Massinger (1583–1640) English Playwright
There are nights when the wolves are silent and only the moon howls.
—George Carlin (1937–2008) American Stand-up Comedian
Night brings our troubles to the light, rather than banishes them.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
Night is the other half of life, and the better half.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Earth, turning from the sun, brings night to man.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
Whoever thinks of going to bed before twelve o clock is a scoundrel.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
The worm of conscience is the companion of the owl.—The light is shunned by sinners and evil spirits only.
—Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) German Poet, Dramatist
However long the night, the dawn will break.
—African Proverb
In the country the darkness of night is friendly and familiar, but in a city, with its blaze of lights, it is unnatural, hostile and menacing. It is like a monstrous vulture that hovers, biding its time.
—W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) British Novelist, Short-Story Writer, Playwright
Nothing like a nighttime stroll to give you ideas.
—J. K. Rowling (b.1965) English Novelist
Night is a world lit by itself.
—Antonio Porchia (1885–1968) Italian Poet
Night is the blotting paper for many sorrows.
—Indian Proverb
I love night more than day—she is so lovely; But I love night the most because she brings My love to me in dreams which scarcely lie.
—Philip James Bailey (1816–1902) English Poet
Under thy mantle black, there hidden lie, light-shunning theft, and traitorous intent, abhorred bloodshed, and vile felony, shameful deceit, and danger imminent, foul horror, and eke hellish dreriment.
—Edmund Spenser (1552–99) English Poet
I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.
—Vincent van Gogh (1853–90) Dutch Painter
Darkness has divinity for me; it strikes thought inward; it drives back the soul to settle on herself, our point supreme! There lies our theater; there sits our judge. Darkness the curtain drops o’er life’s dull scene; ’tis the kind hand of Providence stretched out ‘twixt man and vanity: ’tis reason’s reign, and virtue’s too; these tutelary shades are man’s asylum from the tainted throng. Night is the good man’s friend, and guardian too; it no less rescues virtue, than inspires.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
And the night shall be filled with music, and the cares, that infest the day, shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, and as silently steal away.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–82) American Poet, Educator, Academic
Press close bare-bosomed night—press close magnetic nourishing night! Night of south winds! night of the large few stars! Still nodding night! mad naked summer night.
—Walt Whitman (1819–92) American Poet, Essayist, Journalist, American, Poet, Essayist, Journalist
One summer night, out on a flat headland, all but surrounded by the waters of the bay, the horizons were remote and distant rims on the edge of space. Millions of stars blazed in darkness, and on the far shore a few lights burned in cottages. Otherwise there was no reminder of human life. My companion and I were alone with the stars: the misty river of the Milky Way flowing across the sky, the patterns of the constellations standing out bright and clear, a blazing planet low on the horizon. It occurred to me that if this were a sight that could be seen only once in a century, this little headland would be thronged with spectators. But it can be seen many scores of nights in any year, and so the lights burned in the cottages and the inhabitants probably gave not a thought to the beauty overhead; and because they could see it almost any night, perhaps they never will.
—Rachel Carson (1907–64) American Naturalist, Science Writer
Thank Heaven, the sun has gone in, and I don’t have to go out and enjoy it.
—Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946) American-British Essayist, Bibliophile
These blessed candles of the night.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
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