Inspirational Quotes by J.R.R. Tolkien — Words of Wisdom for Daily Success

“This thing all things devours:”

“I sit beside the fire and think”

“We set out to save the Shire, Sam and it has been saved - but not for me.”

“He knew now why Beregond spoke his name with love. He was a captain that men would follow, that he would follow, even under the shadow of the black wings.”

“Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.”

“In this hour, I do not believe that any darkness will endure.”

“Then hope unlooked-for came so suddenly to Eomer's heart, and with it the bite of care and fear renewed, that he said no more, but turned and went swiftly from the hall.”

“Still we shall have to try,' said Frodo. 'It's no worse than I expected. I never hoped to get across. I can't see any hope of it now. But I've still got to do the best I can.”

“And in that very moment, away behind in some courtyard of the City, a cock crowed. Shrill and clear he crowed, recking nothing of wizardry or war, welcoming only the morning that in the sky far above the shadows of death was coming with the dawn.”

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.”

“He never had any real hope in the affair from the beginning;but being a cheerful hobbit he had not needed hope,as long as despair could be postponed.”

“For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.”

“Oft hope is born when all is forlorn.”

“It is not despair, for despair is only for those who see the end beyond all doubt. We do not.”

“Courage will now be your best defence against the storm that is at hand-—that and such hope as I bring.”

“Being a cheerful hobbit, he had not needed hope, as long as despair could be postponed.”

“Ónen i-estel edain, ú-chebin estel anim.”

“Out of doubt, out of dark to the day's rising”

“Frodo raised his head, and then stood up. Despair had not left him, but the weakness had passed. He even smiled grimly, feeling now as clearly as a moment before he had felt the opposite, that what he had to do, he had to do, if he could, and that whether Faramir or Aragorn or Elrond or Galadriel or Gandalf or anyone else knew about it was beside the purpose. He took his staff in one hand and the phial in his other. When he saw that the clear light was already welling through his fingers, he thrust it into his bosom and held it against his heart. Then turning from the city of Morgul, now no more than a grey glimmer across a dark gulf, he prepared to take the upward road.”

“That is a fair lord and a great captain of men," said Legolas. "If Gondor has such men still in these days of fading, great must have been its glory in the days of its rising.”

“Before the gates of Angband filth and desolation spread southward for many miles over the wide plain of Ard-galen; but after the coming of the Sun rich grass arose there, and while Angband was besieged and its gates shut there were green things even among the pits and broken rocks before the doors of hell.”

“There is still hope...You are not alone.”

“I have spoken words of hope. But only of hope. Hope is not victory.”

“What did I tell you? Something's happening!' cried Sam. '"The war's going well," said Shagrat; but Gorbag he wasn't so sure. And he was right there too. Things are looking up, Mr. Frodo. haven't you got some hope now?'”

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

“Human stories are practically always about one thing, really, aren't they? Death. The inevitability of death. . .”

“Through Rohan over fen and field where the long grass grows”

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.”

“Oh! That was poetry!" said Pippin. "Do you really mean to start before the break of day?”

“Fare well we call to hearth and hall”

“The world was fair, the mountains tall”

“Ho! Ho! Ho! To the bottle I go”

“Far over the misty mountains cold”

“Still round the corner there may wait”

“All that is gold does not glitter,”

“Then, Éowyn of Rohan, I say to you that you are beautiful. In the valleys of our hills there are flowers fair and bright, and maidens fairer still; but neither flower nor lady have I seen till now in Gondor so lovely, and so sorrowful. It may be that only a few days are left ere darkness falls upon our world, and when it comes I hope to face it steadily; but it would ease my heart, if while the Sun yet shines, I could see you still. For you and I have both passed under the wings of the Shadow, and the same hand drew us back.”

“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament … There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves upon earth.”

“To crooked eyes truth may wear a wry face”

“After all, I believe that legends and myths are largely made of 'truth', and indeed present aspects of it that can only be received in this mode; and long ago certain truths and modes of this kind were discovered and must always reappear.”

“There is nothing like looking, if you want to find something. You usually find something, if you look, but it is not always quite the something you were after.”

“Indeed if fish had fish-lore and Wise-fish, it is probable that the business of anglers would be very little hindered.”

“A King will have his way in his own hall, be it folly or wisdom.”

“Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens,'said Gimli.”

“He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.”

“There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

“Never laugh at live dragons.”

“I perceived or thought of the Light of God and in it suspended one small mote (or millions of motes to only one of which was my small mind directed), glittering white because of the individual ray from the Light which both held and lit it...And the ray was the Guardian Angel of the mote: not a thing interposed between God and the creature, but God's very attention itself, personalized...This is a finite parallel to the Infinite. As the love of the Father and Son (who are infinite and equal) is a Person, so the love and attention of the Light to the Mote is a person (that is both with us and in Heaven): finite but divine, i.e. angelic.”

“We all long for Eden, and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature at its best and least corrupted, its gentlest and most human, is still soaked with the sense of exile.”

“We have come from God, and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Indeed only by myth-making, only by becoming 'sub-creator' and inventing stories, can Man aspire to the state of perfection that he knew before the Fall. Our myths may be misguided, but they steer however shakily towards the true harbour, while materialistic 'progress' leads only to a yawning abyss and the Iron Crown of the power of evil.”

“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”

“If you have ever seen a dragon in a pinch, you will realize that this was only poetical exaggeration applied to any hobbit, even to Old Took's great-grand-uncle Bullroarer, who was so huge (for a hobbit) that he could ride a horse. He charged the ranks of the goblins of Mount Gram in the Battle of the Green Fields, and knocked their king Golfimbul's head clean off with a wooden club. It sailed a hundred yards through the air and went down a rabbit-hole, and in this way the battle was won and the game of Golf invented at the same moment.”

“I was talking aloud to myself. A habit of the old: they choose the wisest person present to speak to”

“Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?”

““Journey’s end”

““I sit beside the fire and think”