Source identified
“In a world where all is fleeting, change alone endures.”
Stability is temporary, so practical judgment requires expecting change rather than treating present arrangements as permanent.
Source note: Counsels and Maxims, T. Bailey Saunders translation, in a discussion of fortune and apparent stability.
Source identified
“I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love.”
Death becomes continuity with nature rather than simple disappearance, connecting mortality with renewal, earth, and the lives that follow.
Source note: Final section of “Song of Myself”; the speaker imagines returning physically to the earth.
Source identified
“We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”
Voice: Fictional character · Prospero
The line emphasizes impermanence and the dreamlike brevity of human life.
Source note: Act 4, Scene 1.
Source identified
“The unexamined life is not worth living.”
Voice: Dialogue speaker · Socrates
Socrates links a worthwhile human life with reflection on beliefs, conduct, and reasons rather than unexamined routine.
Source note: Apology 38a; wording varies by translation.
Source identified
“To be, or not to be: that is the question.”
Voice: Fictional character · Hamlet
The line condenses an existential dilemma into a question about endurance, action, fear, and the unknown consequences of death.
Source note: Act 3, Scene 1; Hamlet weighs existence against suffering and uncertainty.
Source identified
“He who binds to himself a joy does the winged life destroy.”
Trying to possess a joyful moment permanently can damage it, while accepting impermanence allows experience to remain alive and free.
Source note: Short poem commonly titled “Eternity”; Blake contrasts grasping with the passing movement of joy.