William Cowper Quotes
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But conversation, choose what theme we may, And chiefly when religion leads the way, Should flow, like waters after summer show'rs, Not as if raised by mere mechanic powers.
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Truth is the golden girdle of the globe.
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Learning itself, received into a mind By nature weak, or viciously inclined, Serves but to lead philosophers astray, Where children would with ease discern the way.
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Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.
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A fretful temper will divide the closest knot that may be tied, by ceaseless sharp corrosion; a temper passionate and fierce may suddenly your joys disperse at one immense explosion.
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Could he with reason murmur at his case, Himself sole author of his own disgrace?
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Some men make gain a fountain, whence proceeds A stream of liberal and heroic deeds; The swell of pity, not to be confined Within the scanty limits of the mind.
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There goes the parson, oh illustrious spark! And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk.
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The slaves of custom and established mode, With pack-horse constancy we keep the road Crooked or straight, through quags or thorny dells, True to the jingling of our leader's bells.
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Time, as he passes us, has a dove's wing, Unsoil'd, and swift, and of a silken sound.
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Ages elapsed ere Homer's lamp appear'd, And ages ere the Mantuan swan was heard: To carry nature lengths unknown before, To give a Milton birth, ask'd ages more.
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Blest be the art that can immortalize,--the art that baffles time's tyrannic claim to quench it.
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A man renowned for repartee will seldom scruple to make free with friendship's finest feeling, will thrust a dagger at your breast, and say he wounded you in jest, by way of balm for healing.
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There is mercy in every place. And mercy, encouraging thought gives even affliction a grace and reconciles man to his lot.
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A noisy man is always in the right.
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Admirals extolled for standing still, or doing nothing with a deal of skill.
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All affectation; 'tis my perfect scorn; Object of my implacable disgust.
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The earth was made so various, that the mind Of desultory man, studious of change, And pleased with novelty, might be indulged.
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Some people are more nice than wise.
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The Cross! There, and there only (though the deist rave, and the atheist, if Earth bears so base a slave); There and there only, is the power to save.
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I have a kitten,the drollest of all creatures that ever wore a cat's skin.
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He that negotiates between God and man, As God's ambassador, the grand concerns Of judgment and of mercy, should beware Of lightness in his speech.
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[My kitten's] gambols are not to be described, and would be incredible, if they could.
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When scandal has new-minted an old lie, Or tax'd invention for a fresh supply, 'Tis call'd a satire, and the world appears Gathering around it with erected ears; A thousand names are toss'd into the crowd, Some whisper'd softly, and some twang'd aloud, Just as the sapience of an author's brain, Suggests it safe or dangerous to be plain.