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Quote#Art

For I think it is the case with genius that it is not when quiescent…

Quote byGerard Manley Hopkins · 1844–1889

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Letters, etc, Letter to A.W.M. Baillie (10 September 1864).

English (original)

For I think it is the case with genius that it is not when quiescent so very much above mediocrity as the difference between the two might lead us to think, but that it has the power and privilege of rising from that level to a height utterly far from mediocrity: in other words that its greatness is that it can be so great.

— Gerard Manley Hopkins

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