Ellen Sturgis Hooper

Portrait of Ellen Sturgis Hooper, painted by James Abbott McNeill Whistler.

Ellen Sturgis Hooper (February 17, 1812 – November 3, 1848) was an American poet, whose work is occasionally reprinted in anthologies.

Quotes

• I slept, and dreamed that life was Beauty;
  I woke, and found that life was Duty.
  Was thy dream then a shadowy lie?
  Toil on, poor heart, unceasingly;
  And thou shalt find thy dream to be
  A truth and noonday light to thee.
  • Life a Duty, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919). Compare: "Straight is the line of Duty, / Curved is the line of Beauty, / Follow the straight line, thou hall see / The curved line ever follow thee", William Maccall (c. 1830).