William Cowper Quotes
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There is in souls a sympathy with sounds.
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Still ending, and beginning still.
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Variety's the very spice of life, That gives it all its flavor.
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This fond attachment to the well-known place Whence first we started into life's long race, Maintains its hold with such unfailing sway, We feel it e'en in age, and at our latest day.
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In a fleshly tomb, I am buried above ground.
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Is base in kind, and born to be a slave.
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Tis Providence alone secures In every change both mine and yours.
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The nurse sleeps sweetly, hired to watch the sick, / whom, snoring, she disturbs.
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And, of all lies (be that one poet's boast) / The lie that flatters I abhor the most.
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Trials make the promise sweet, Trials give new life to prayer; Trials bring me to His feet, Lay me low, and keep me there.
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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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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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That good diffused may more abundant grow.
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All we behold is miracle.
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To see the Law by Christ fulfilled, And hear His pardoning voice Changes a slave into a child, And duty into choice.
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Blest be the art that can immortalize.
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Most satirists are indeed a public scourge; Their mildest physic is a farrier's purge; Their acrid temper turns, as soon as stirr'd, The milk of their good purpose all to curd. Their zeal begotten, as their works rehearse, By lean despair upon an empty purse.
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Ceremony leads her bigots forth, prepared to fight for shadows of no worth. While truths, on which eternal things depend, can hardly find a single friend.
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But animated nature sweeter still, to soothe and satisfy the human ear.
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Hast thou not learnd what thou art often told, A truth still sacred, and believed of old, That no success attends on spears and swords Unblest, and that the battle is the Lords?
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There is a pleasure in poetic pains / Which only poets know.
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How soft the music of those village bells, Falling at interval upon the ear In cadence sweet; now dying all away, Now pealing loud again, and louder still, Clear and sonorous, as the gale comes on! With easy force it opens all the cells Where Memory slept.
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In man or woman, but far most in man, And most of all in man that ministers, And serves the altar, in my soul I loathe All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn: Object of my implacable disgust.
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Elegant as simplicity, and warm As ecstasy.