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Moderate Sorrow Fits Vulgar Love, And For A Vulgar Man: But I Have Lov'd With Such Transcendent Passion, I Soar'd, At First, Quite Out Of Reason's View, And Now Am Lost Above It.

-John Dryden

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Moderate Sorrow Fits Vulgar

John Dryden

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Moderate Sorrow Fits Vulgar Love, And For A Vulgar Man: But I Have Lov'd With Such Transcendent Passion, I Soar'd, At First, Quite Out Of Reason's View, And Now Am Lost Above It.

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Kings Fight For Empires, Madmen For Applause.

None But The Brave Deserve The Fair.

She, Though In Full-blown Flower Of Glorious Beauty, Grows Cold Even In The Summer Of Her Age.

Criticism Is Now Become Mere Hangman's Work, And Meddles Only With The Faults Of Authors ; Nay, The Critic Is Disgusted Less With Their Absurdities Than Excellence ; And You Cannot Displease Him More Than In Leaving Him Little Room For His Malice.

Drinking Is The Soldier's Pleasure.

I Maintain, Against The Enemies Of The Stage, That Patterns Of Piety, Decently Represented, May Second The Precepts.

Thoughts Cannot Form Themselves In Words So Horrid As Can Express My Guilt.

Men's Virtues I Have Commended As Freely As I Have Taxed Their Crimes.

Set All Things In Their Own Peculiar Place, And Know That Order Is The Greatest Grace.

Time And Death Shall Depart And Say In Flying Love Has Found Out A Way To Live, By Dying.

Having Mourned Your Sin, For Outward Eden Lost, Find Paradise Within.

Take The Good The Gods Provide Thee.

Old Age Creeps On Us Ere We Think It Nigh.

If You Are For A Merry Jaunt, I Will Try, For Once, Who Can Foot It Farthest.

Prodigious Actions May As Well Be Done, By Weaver's Issue, As The Prince's Son.

For All The Happiness Mankind Can Gain Is Not In Pleasure, But In Rest From Pain.

Shakespeare Was Naturally Learned; He Needed Not The Spectacles Of The Books To Read Nature; He Looked Inward, And Found Her There.

It Is A Madness To Make Fortune The Mistress Of Events, Because In Herself She Is Nothing, Can Rule Nothing, But Is Ruled By Prudence.

New Vows To Plight, And Plighted Vows To Break.

Plots, True Or False, Are Necessary Things, To Raise Up Commonwealths And Ruin Kings.

Pleasure Never Comes Sincere To Man; But Lent By Heaven Upon Hard Usury.

The Commendation Of Adversaries Is The Greatest Triumph Of A Writer, Because It Never Comes Unless Extorted.

Be Slow To Resolve, But Quick In Performance.

We Can Never Be Grieved For Their Miseries Who Are Thoroughly Wicked, And Have Thereby Justly Called Their Calamities On Themselves.

Either Be Wholly Slaves Or Wholly Free.

The Fates But Only Spin The Coarser Clue; The Finest Of The Wool Is Left For You.

Moderate Sorrow Fits Vulgar Love, And For A Vulgar Man: But I Have Lov'd With Such Transcendent Passion, I Soar'd, At First, Quite Out Of Reason's View, And Now Am Lost Above It.

Trust On And Think To-morrow Will Repay; To-morrow's Falser Than The Former Day; Lies Worse; And While It Says, We Shall Be Blest With Some New Joys, Cuts Off What We Possest.

All Things Are Subject To Decay And When Fate Summons, Monarchs Must Obey.

Truth Is Never To Be Expected From Authors Whose Understanding Is Warped With Enthusiasm.

And That The Scriptures, Though Not Everywhere Free From Corruption, Or Entire, Or Clear, Are Uncorrupt, Sufficient, Clear, Entire In All Things Which Our Needful Faith Require.

Her Wit Was More Than Man, Her Innocence A Child.

Beware The Fury Of A Patient Man.

Or Hast Thou Known The World So Long In Vain?

Fortune Confounds The Wise, And When They Least Expect It Turns The Dice.

They Think Too Little Who Talk Too Much.

Restless At Home, And Ever Prone To Range.

Every Age Has A Kind Of Universal Genius, Which Inclines Those That Live In It To Some Particular Studies.

Forgiveness To The Injured Does Belong; But They Ne'er Pardon Who Have Done Wrong.

How Easy It Is To Call Rogue And Villain, And That Wittily! But How Hard To Make A Man Appear A Fool, A Blockhead, Or A Knave, Without Using Any Of Those Opprobrious Terms! Tosparethegrossness Ofthenames, And To Dothe Thing Yet Moreseverely, Isto Drawa Full Face, And Tomake The Nose And Cheeks Stand Out, And Yet Not To Employ Any Depth Of Shadowing.

Beauty, Like Ice, Our Footing Does Betray; Who Can Tread Sure On The Smooth, Slippery Way: Pleased With The Surface, We Glide Swiftly On, And See The Dangers That We Cannot Shun.

Those Who Write Ill, And They Who Ne'er Durst Write, Turn Critics Out Of Mere Revenge And Spite.

From Plots And Treasons Heaven Preserve My Years, But Save Me Most From My Petitioners. Unsatiate As The Barren Womb Or Grave; God Cannot Grant So Much As They Can Crave.

For They Can Conquer Who Believe They Can.

Treason Is Greatest Where Trust Is Greatest.

The Fool Of Nature Stood With Stupid Eyes And Gaping Mouth, That Testified Surprise.

They Say Everything In The World Is Good For Something.

Doeg, Though Without Knowing How Or Why, Made Still A Blundering Kind Of Melody; Spurr'd Boldly On, And Dash'd Through Thick And Thin, Through Sense And Nonsense, Never Out Nor In; Free From All Meaning Whether Good Or Bad, And In One Word, Heroically Mad.

But When To Sin Our Biased Nature Leans, The Careful Devil Is Still At Hand With Means; And Providently Pimps For Ill Desires.

If We From Wealth To Poverty Descend, Want Gives To Know The Flatterer From The Friend.

Love Is Love's Reward.

Bacchus Ever Fair And Young, Drinking Joys Did First Ordain. Bachus's Blessings Are A Treasure, Drinking Is The Soldier's Pleasure, Rich The Treasure, Sweet The Pleasure- Sweet Is Pleasure After Pain.

Fattened In Vice, So Callous And So Gross, He Sins And Sees Not, Senseless Of His Loss.

All Flowers Will Droop In The Absence Of The Sun That Waked Their Sweets.

For Those Whom God To Ruin Has Design'd, He Fits For Fate, And First Destroys Their Mind.

Is It Not Evident, In These Last Hundred Years (when The Study Of Philosophy Has Been The Business Of All The Virtuosi In Christendome) That Almost A New Nature Has Been Revealed To Us? That More Errours Of The School Have Been Detected, More Useful Experiments In Philosophy Have Been Made, More Noble Secrets In Opticks, Medicine, Anatomy, Astronomy, Discover'd, Than In All Those Credulous And Doting Ages From Aristotle To Us? So True It Is That Nothing Spreads More Fast Than Science, When Rightly And Generally Cultivated.

I'm A Little Wounded, But I Am Not Slain; I Will Lay Me Down To Bleed A While. Then I'll Rise And Fight Again.

My Love's A Noble Madness.

Good Sense And Good Nature Are Never Separated; And Good Nature Is The Product Of Right Reason.

So The False Spider, When Her Nets Are Spread, Deep Ambushed In Her Silent Den Does Lie.

If All The World Be Worth Thy Winning. / Think, Oh Think It Worth Enjoying: / Lovely Thaïs Sits Beside Thee, / Take The Good The Gods Provide Thee.

Music, Music For A While Shall All Your Cares Beguile. Alexander's Feast

No Government Has Ever Been, Or Can Ever Be, Wherein Time-servers And Blockheads Will Not Be Uppermost.

But Shakespeare's Magic Could Not Copied Be; Within That Circle None Durst Walk But He.

Death In Itself Is Nothing; But We Fear To Be We Know Not What, We Know Not Where.

Sweet Is Pleasure After Pain.

The Winds That Never Moderation Knew, Afraid To Blow Too Much, Too Faintly Blew; Or Out Of Breath With Joy, Could Not Enlarge Their Straighten'd Lungs Or Conscious Of Their Charge.

I Learn To Pity Woes So Like My Own.

With Odorous Oil Thy Head And Hair Are Sleek; And Then Thou Kemb'st The Tuzzes On Thy Cheek: Of These, My Barbers Take A Costly Care.

The Greater Part Performed Achieves The Less.

Thou Spring'st A Leak Already In Thy Crown, A Flaw Is In Thy Ill-bak'd Vessel Found; 'tis Hollow, And Returns A Jarring Sound, Yet Thy Moist Clay Is Pliant To Command, Unwrought, And Easy To The Potter's Hand: Now Take The Mould; Now Bend Thy Mind To Feel The First Sharp Motions Of The Forming Wheel.

Here Lies My Wife: Here Let Her Lie! Now She's At Rest, And So Am I.

Let Cheerfulness On Happy Fortune Wait.

A Brave Man Scorns To Quarrel Once A Day; Like Hectors In At Every Petty Fray.

Love Is A Passion Which Kindles Honor Into Noble Acts.

Murder May Pass Unpunishd For A Time, But Tardy Justice Will Oertake The Crime.

A Lively Faith Will Bear Aloft The Mind, And Leave The Luggage Of Good Works Behind.

Since Every Man Who Lives Is Born To Die, And None Can Boast Sincere Felicity, With Equal Mind, What Happens, Let Us Bear, Nor Joy Nor Grieve Too Much For Things Beyond Our Care. Like Pilgrims To The' Appointed Place We Tend; The World's An Inn, And Death The Journey's End.

That Gloomy Outside, Like A Rusty Chest, Contains The Shoring Treasure Of A Soul Resolved And Brave.

But Wild Ambition Loves To Slide, Not Stand, And Fortune's Ice Prefers To Virtue's Land.

When I Consider Life, It Is All A Cheat. Yet Fooled With Hope, People Favor This Deceit.

An Ugly Woman In A Rich Habit Set Out With Jewels Nothing Can Become.

A Farce Is That In Poetry Which Grotesque (caricature) Is In Painting. The Persons And Actions Of A Farce Are All Unnatural, And The Manners False, That Is, Inconsistent With The Characters Of Mankind; And Grotesque Painting Is The Just Resemblance Of This.

And Plenty Makes Us Poor.

Imitation Pleases, Because It Affords Matter For Inquiring Into The Truth Or Falsehood Of Imitation, By Comparing Its Likeness Or Unlikeness With The Original.

For Granting We Have Sinned, And That The Offence Of Man Is Made Against Omnipotence, Some Price That Bears Proportion Must Be Paid, And Infinite With Infinite Be Weighed.

God Has Endowed Man With Inalienable Rights, Among Which Are Self-government, Reason, And Conscience. Man Is Properly Self-governed Only When He Is Guided Rightly And Governed By His Maker, Divine Truth And Love.

Let Grace And Goodness Be The Principal Loadstone Of Thy Affections.

Maintain Your Post: That's All The Fame You Need; For 'tis Impossible You Should Proceed.

For Art May Err, But Nature Cannot Miss.

Silence In Times Of Suffering Is The Best.

Genius Must Be Born, It Can't Be Taught.

He Is The Very Janus Of Poets; He Wears Almost Everywhere Two Faces; And You Have Scarce Begun To Admire The One, Ere You Despise The Other.

A Lazy Frost, A Numbness Of The Mind.

Even Kings But Play; And When Their Part Is Done, Some Other, Worse Or Better, Mounts The Throne.

For Thee, Sweet Month; The Groves Green Liveries Wear. If Not The First, The Fairest Of The Year; For Thee The Graces Lead The Dancing Hours, And Nature's Ready Pencil Paints The Flowers. When Thy Short Reign Is Past, The Feverish Sun The Sultry Tropic Fears, And Moves More Slowly On.

They, Who Would Combat General Authority With Particular Opinion, Must First Establish Themselves A Reputation Of Understanding Better Than Other Men.

Satire Among The Romans, But Not Among The Greeks, Was A Bitter Invective Poem.

Genius Must Be Born, And Never Can Be Taught.

How Happy The Lover, How Easy His Chain, How Pleasing His Pain, How Sweet To Discover He Sighs Not In Vain.

Could Swell The Soul To Rage, Or Kindle Soft Desire.

Desire Of Greatness Is A Godlike Sin.

Old As I Am, For Ladies' Love Unfit, The Power Of Beauty I Remember Yet.

Three Poets, In Three Distant Ages Born, Greece, Italy, And England Did Adorn. The First In Loftiness Of Thought Surpass'd; The Next, In Majesty; In Both The Last. The Force Of Nature Could No Further Go; To Make A Third, She Join'd The Former Two.

What Passion Cannot Music Raise And Quell!

Like Pilgrims To Th' Appointed Place We Tend; The World's An Inn, And Death The Journey's End.

Beware Of The Fury Of The Patient Man.

Good Heaven, Whose Darling Attribute We Find Is Boundless Grace, And Mercy To Mankind, Abhors The Cruel.

Grace And Mercy

What, Start At This! When Sixty Years Have Spread. Their Grey Experience O'er Thy Hoary Head? Is This The All Observing Age Could Gain? Or Hast Thou Known The World So Long In Vain?

None, None Descends Into Himself, To Find The Secret Imperfections Of His Mind: But Every One Is Eagle-ey'd To See Another's Faults, And His Deformity.

Not Judging Truth To Be In Nature Better Than Falsehood, But Setting A Value Upon Both According To Interest.

Not Heav'n Itself Upon The Past Has Pow'r; But What Has Been, Has Been, And I Have Had My Hour.

Sculptors Are Obliged To Follow The Manners Of The Painters, And To Make Many Ample Folds, Which Are Unsufferable Hardness, And More Like A Rock Than A Natural Garment.

To Take Up Half On Trust, And Half To Try, Name It Not Faith But Bungling Bigotry.

…so When The Last And Dreadful Hour This Crumbling Pageant Shall Devour, The Trumpet Shall Be Heard On High, The Dead Shall Live, The Living Die, And Music Shall Untune The Sky

That, If The Gentiles, (whom No Law Inspir'd,) By Nature Did What Was By Law Requir'd; They, Who The Written Rule And Never Known, Were To Themselves Both Rule And Law Alone: To Natures Plain Indictment They Shall Plead; And, By Their Conscience, Be Condemn'd Or Freed.

My Heart's So Full Of Joy, That I Shall Do Some Wild Extravagance Of Love In Public; And The Foolish World, Which Knows Not Tenderness, Will Think Me Mad.

When I Consider Life, 't Is All A Cheat. Yet Fool'd With Hope, Men Favour The Deceit; Trust On, And Think To-morrow Will Repay. To-morrow 's Falser Than The Former Day; Lies Worse, And While It Says We Shall Be Blest With Some New Joys, Cuts Off What We Possest. Strange Cozenage! None Would Live Past Years Again, Yet All Hope Pleasure In What Yet Remain; And From The Dregs Of Life Think To Receive What The First Sprightly Running Could Not Give.

And, Dying, Bless The Hand That Gave The Blow.

Many Things Impossible To Thought Have Been By Need To Full Perfection Brought.

My Hands Are Guilty, But My Heart Is Free.

Self-defense Is Nature's Eldest Law.

So Poetry, Which Is In Oxford Made An Art, In London Only Is A Trade.

I Never Saw Any Good That Came Of Telling Truth.

Telling The Truth

She Feared No Danger, For She Knew No Sin.

The Fortitude Of A Christian Consists In Patience, Not In Enterprises Which The Poets Call Heroic, And Which Are Commonly The Effects Of Interest, Pride And Worldly Honor.

What Judgment I Had Increases Rather Than Diminishes; And Thoughts, Such As They Are, Come Crowding In So Fast Upon Me, That My Only Difficulty Is To Choose Or Reject; To Run Them Into Verse Or To Give Them The Other Harmony Of Prose.

Of All The Tyrannies On Human Kind The Worst Is That Which Persecutes The Mind.

Pride - Lord Of Human Kind

The Gods, (if Gods To Goodness Are Inclined If Acts Of Mercy Touch Their Heavenly Mind), And, More Than All The Gods, Your Generous Heart, Conscious Of Worth, Requite Its Own Desert!

War Seldom Enters But Where Wealth Allures.

Shakespeare Was The Homer, Or Father Of Our Dramatic Poets;jonson Was Thevirgil, The Pattern Of Elaborate Writing; I Admire Him, But I Love Shakespeare.

We By Art Unteach What Nature Taught.

Anger Will Never Disappear So Long As Thoughts Of Resentment Are Cherished In The Mind. Anger Will Disappear Just As Soon As Thoughts Of Resentment Are Forgotten.

Bankrupt Of Life, Yet Prodigal Of Ease.

Words Are But Pictures Of Our Thoughts.

It Is Sufficient To Say, According To The Proverb, That Here Is God's Plenty.

Among Our Crimes Oblivion May Be Set.

Merit Challenges Envy.

The Jews, A Headstrong, Moody, Murmuring Race.

And Love's The Noblest Frailty Of The Mind.

Secret Guilt Is By Silence Revealed.

Desire Of Power, On Earth A Vicious Weed, Yet, Sprung From High, Is Of Celestial Seed: In God 'tisglory; And When Men Aspire, 'tis But A Spark Too Much Of Heavenly Fire.

And He, Who Servilely Creeps After Sense, Is Safe, But Ne'er Will Reach An Excellence.

Ever A Glutton, At Another's Cost, But In Whose Kitchen Dwells Perpetual Frost.

But 'tis The Talent Of Our English Nation, Still To Be Plotting Some New Reformation.

We Must Beat The Iron While It Is Hot, But We May Polish It At Leisure.

He Made All Countries Where He Came His Own.

The Propriety Of Thoughts And Words, Which Are The Hidden Beauties Of A Play, Are But Confusedly Judged In The Vehemence Of Action.

At Home The Hateful Names Of Parties Cease, And Factious Souls Are Wearied Into Peace.

We Find Few Historians Who Have Been Diligent Enough In Their Search For Truth; It Is Their Common Method To Take On Trust What They Help Distribute To The Public; By Which Means A Falsehood Once Received From A Famed Writer Becomes Traditional To Posterity.

The Unhappy Man, Who Once Has Trail'd A Pen, Lives Not To Please Himself, But Other Men; Is Always Drudging, Wastes His Life And Blood, Yet Only Eats And Drinks What You Think Good.

Shame On The Body For Breaking Down While The Spirit Perseveres.

The Elephant Is Never Won By Anger; Nor Must That Man Who Would Reclaim A Lion Take Him By The Teeth.

Nor Is The People's Judgment Always True: The Most May Err As Grossly As The Few.

Democracies Have

So Softly Death Succeeded Life In Her, She Did But Dream Of Heaven, And She Was There.

It Is Almost Impossible To Translate Verbally And Well At The Same Time; For The Latin (a Most Severe And Compendious Language) Often Expresses That In One Word Which Either The Barbarity Or The Narrowness Of Modern Tongues Cannot Supply In More. ...but Since Every Language Is So Full Of Its Own Proprieties That What Is Beautiful In One Is Often Barbarous, Nay, Sometimes Nonsense, In Another, It Would Be Unreasonable To Limit A Translator To The Narrow Compass Of His Author's Words; It Is Enough If He Choose Out Some Expression Which Does Not Vitiate The Sense.

Whatever Is, Is In Its Causes Just.

A Coward Is The Kindest Animal; 'tis The Most Forgiving Creature In A Fight.

He Who Trusts Secrets To A Servant Makes Him His Master

Keeping Secrets

Death Ends Our Woes, And The Kind Grave Shuts Up The Mournful Scene.

Light Sufferings Give Us Leisure To Complain.

Happy, Happy, Happy Pair! None But The Brave Deserves The Fair.

Better One Suffer Than A Nation Grieve.

But How Can Finite Grasp Infinity?

How Easy 'tis, When Destiny Proves Kind, With Full-spread Sails To Run Before The Wind!

'tis A Good Thing To Laugh At Any Rate; And If A Straw Can Tickle A Man, It Is An Instrument Of Happiness.

Ye Moon And Stars, Bear Witness To The Truth.

Freedom Which In No Other Land Will Thrive, Freedom An English Subject's Sole Prerogative.

My Right Eye Itches, Some Good Luck Is Near.

Fool That I Was, Upon My Eagle's Wings I Bore This Wren, Till I Was Tired With Soaring, And Now He Mounts Above Me.

For Secrets Are Edged Tools, And Must Be Kept From Children And From Fools.

He Who Proposes To Be An Author Should First Be A Student.

Bold Knaves Thrive Without One Grain Of Sense, But Good Men Starve For Want Of Impudence.

Reason To Rule, Mercy To Forgive: The First Is Law, The Last Prerogative. Life Is An Adventure In Forgiveness.

The Thought Of Being Nothing After Death Is A Burden Insupportable To A Virtuous Man.

To So Perverse A Sex All Grace Is Vain.

And Nobler Is A Limited Command, Given By The Love Of All Your Native Land, Than A Successive Title, Long And Dark, Drawn From The Mouldy Rolls Of Noah's Ark.

The People's Prayer, The Glad Diviner's Theme, The Young Men's Vision, And The Old Men's Dream!

You See Through Love, And That Deludes Your Sight, As What Is Straight Seems Crooked Through The Water.

Let Grace And Goodness Be The Principal Loadstone Of Thy Affections. For Love Which Hath Ends, Will Have An End; Whereas That Which Is Founded On True Virtue, Will Always Continue.

Ill Habits Gather Unseen Degrees, As Brooks Make Rivers, Rivers Run To Seas.

If By The People You Understand The Multitude, The Hoi Polloi, 'tis No Matter What They Think; They Are Sometimes In The Right, Sometimes In The Wrong; Their Judgment Is A Mere Lottery.

An Hour Will Come, With Pleasure To Relate Your Sorrows Past, As Benefits Of Fate.

Go Miser Go, For Money Sell Your Soul. Trade Wares For Wares And Trudge From Pole To Pole, So Others May Say When You Are Dead And Gone. See What A Vast Estate He Left His Son.

He With A Graceful Pride, While His Rider Every Hand Survey'd, Sprung Loose, And Flew Into An Escapade; Not Moving Forward, Yet With Every Bound Pressing, And Seeming Still To Quit His Ground.

As One That Neither Seeks, Nor Shuns His Foe.

Ill Fortune Seldom Comes Alone.

Swift Was The Race, But Short The Time To Run.

By Education Most Have Been Misled; So They Believe, Because They Were Bred. The Priest Continues Where The Nurse Began, And Thus The Child Imposes On The Man.

When Beauty Fires The Blood, How Love Exalts The Mind!

Second Thoughts, They Say, Are Best.

Second Thoughts

Uncertain Whose The Narrowest Span,--the Clown Unread, Or Half-read Gentleman.

Sure There Is None But Fears A Future State; And When The Most Obdurate Swear They Do Not, Their Trembling Hearts Belie Their Boasting Tongues.

We First Make Our Habits, And Then Our Habits Make Us.

Reason Is A Crutch For Age, But Youth Is Strong Enough To Walk Alone.

Few Know The Use Of Life Before 'tis Past.

It's A Hard World, Neighbors, If A Man's Oath Must Be His Master.

The Province Of The Soul Is Large Enough To Fill Up Every Cranny Of Your Time, And Leave You Much To Answer For If One Wretch Be Damned By Your Neglect.

The Conscience Of A People Is Their Power.

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