“They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”
Documented source
Every quote here is traced to a documented source. How we verify →
About this line
Poe opens “Eleonora” by putting his narrator on trial. The man confesses to “dubious sanity” — then immediately turns the charge around. He argues that madness and genius share the same border, that the mind which tips toward one also touches the other, and that what looks like derangement from the outside is sometimes the only instrument fine enough to catch what the rational mind misses entirely. It is a defense brief, written in the opening paragraph of a ghost story. Poe files it without apology.
Why we carry this line
Are you a daydreamer? I am. It was the most positive spin I’d heard on the subject. And that’s why we carry this quote. For all the daydreamers out there.
The design
The day half of the sentence is lit in cream. The night half, “which escape those who dream only by night,” sits in darker gray and steps down and away from the light. Poe’s claim is that the daydreamers see more, so the night-dreamers are literally left in the dark.
Objects carrying this line
Related Lines