William Cowper Quotes
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The proud are ever most provoked by pride.
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Strength may wield the ponderous spade, May turn the clod, and wheel the compost home; But elegance, chief grace the garden shows, And most attractive, is the fair result Of thought, the creature of a polished mind.
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Absence from whom we love is worse than death, and frustrates hope severer than despair.
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The statesman, lawyer, merchant, man of trade Pants for the refuge of some rural shade, Where all his long anxieties forgot Amid the charms of a sequester'd spot, Or recollected only to gild o'er And add a smile to what was sweet before, He may possess the joys he thinks he sees, Lay his old age upon the lap of ease, Improve the remnant of his wasted span. And having lived a trifler, die a man.
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Blest be the art that can immortalize.
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The rich are too indolent, the poor too weak, to bear the insupportable fatigue of thinking.
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Not to understand a treasure's worth till time has stole away the slighted good, is cause of half the poverty we feel, and makes the world the wilderness it is.
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All we behold is miracle.
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Unless a love of virtue light the flame, Satire is, more than those he brands, to blame; He hides behind a magisterial air He own offences, and strips others' bare.
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There is in souls a sympathy with sounds: And as the mind is pitch'd the ear is pleased With melting airs, or martial, brisk or grave; Some chord in unison with what we hear Is touch'd within us, and the heart replies.
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'Tis liberty alone that gives the flower Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume; And we are weeds without it.
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We sacrifice to dress till household joys and comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry, and keeps our larder lean.
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When from soft love proceeds the deep distress, ah! why forbid the willing tears to flow?
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Ye therefore who love mercy, teach your sons to love it, too.
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But truths on which depends our main concern, That 'tis our shame and misery not to learn, Shine by the side of every path we tread With such a lustre he that runs may read.
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Gardening imparts an organic perspective on the passage of time.
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Even in the stifling bosom of the town, A garden, in which nothing thrives, has charms That soothes the rich possessor; much consol'd, That here and there some sprigs of mournful mint, Or nightshade, or valerian, grace the well He cultivates.
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The Spirit breathes upon the Word and brings the truth to sight.
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Is base in kind, and born to be a slave.
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Pity! Religion has so seldom found A skilful guide into poetic ground! The flowers would spring where'er she deign'd to stray And every muse attend her in her way.
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Reasoning at every step he treads, Man yet mistakes his way, Whilst meaner things, whom instinct leads, Are rarely known to stray.
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Philologists, who chase A painting syllable through time and space Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark, To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah's Ark.
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Perhaps thou gav'st me, though unseen, a kiss; Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss.
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Folly ends where genuine hope begins.