Eino Leino Quotes

Eino Leino Quote: The one who understands won’t condemn.

Night’s spectres have met their defeat.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

The one who has knowledge, he won’t condemn.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

Life is always struggle with eternal forces.

Eino Leino

Oh, sensitive be to each other you should,
so hearts aren’t for rocks mistaken!

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

With beautiful echo now let its art
belovèd sound jingle in every heart.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

Eino Leino Quote: And I for my part this surely know,
when life in its course meets obstruction. (Smiling Apollo)

And I for my part this surely know,
when life in its course meets obstruction:
our labour everyone’s worth will show.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)


Eino Leino Quote: He who a single one loves is blessed...

He who a single one loves is blessed –
beloved of everybody.
Whoever self-interest forgets the best
will blessèd dreams embody.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

For see, half the virtues in smile are found
and wicked thoughts are submerged and drowned;
when, open, the heart is to all displayed,
God is close to the ones he has made.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

The one who has knowledge, he won’t condemn.
But, yearnful, his singing is soft to them.
and people’s affections the stronger will make.
And thus way divine they will take.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

One heaven is there, and only one God,
and souls have they all who his paths have trod,
and heaven’s at peace, its work is complete.
Night’s spectres have met their defeat.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

Eino Leino Quote: When phantoms afflict your benighted mind... (Smiling Apollo)

When phantoms afflict your benighted mind,
indulge in love’s pleasure – they’ll vanish.
If, pressing, the darkness your soul it bind,
indulge in love’s pleasure – it banish.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

The others got heart, I got the harp.
They grieved, had fun, me not, me not.
O wretched me, can't live, nor part:
my heart throbs not, but tingles, and rings!

O dire fate, the hardest lot:
no peace grants the night, the day no less,
no mercy shows time, nor eternity:
just a jeering and tingling heart-less-ness.

Eino Leino (The Harp-Of-the-Wind, 1905)

We’re all on a boat and a voyage we share,
we plough the great sea together.
In labour our mothers pain doesn’t spare
at death pain attends us moreover.
But between birth-pangs and our sad demise –
oh, may life with kindness and warmth surprise!
See, when in a storm we’re together as one –
more easily journey’s done.

Eino Leino (Smiling Apollo, 1898)

What is this fragrance around me?
What is this quietness?
What is this knowledge of peace in my heart?
What strange, great, new thing is this?

I can hear the flowers growing
and the talk of the trees in the wood.
I think all my old dreams are ripening,
all the hopes and the wishes I sowed.

Everything’s quiet around me,
Everything’s gentle and sweet.
Great flowers are opening up in my heart
with a fragrance of deepest peace.

Eino Leino (Peace, 1898)

The corncrake's song rings in my ears,
above the rye a full moon sails;
this summer night all sorrow clears
and woodsmoke drifts along the dales,
I do not laugh or grieve, or sigh;
the forest's darkness breathes nearby,
the red of clouds where day sinks deep,
the blue of windy hills asleep,
the twinflower's scent, the water's shade-
of these my heart's own song is made.
You, girl as sweet as summer hay,
my heart's great peace, I sing to you,
O my devotion, tune and play
a wreath of oak twigs, green and new.
I have stopped chasing Jack-o'-Lantern,
I hold gold from the Demon's mountain;
around me life tightens its ring,
time stops, the vane has ceased to swing;
the road before me through the gloom
is leading to the unknown room.

Eino Leino (Nocturne - Translation by Keith Bosley)

Eino Leino Biography

Eino Leino portrait

Born: 1878
Died: 1926

Eino Leino was a Finnish poet and journalist who is highly esteemed and widely read in Finland today. He is best known for his poetry that combines folk elements of the Finnish people with nature, and more.

Notable Works

Smiling Apollo