FastSaying

An epigram is but a feeble thing - With straw in tail, stuck there by way of sting


William Cowper

  Email Quote to Friends   Link to Quote   Create Short URL  Publish Text About This Quote   Share on Facebook, Twitter, and more
  See Recommended Quotes For You

Related

An epigram is but a feeble thing - With straw in tail, stuck there by way of sting.
WILLIAM COWPER The qualities all in a bee that we meet, In an epigram never should fail; The body should alwa...
EDWARD YOUNG Some learned writers . . . have compared a Scorpion to an Epigram . . . because as the sting of the...
EDWARD TOPSELL Every epigram should resemble a bee; it should have sting, honey, and brevity.
MRS. MANLEY Luxury is an enticing pleasure, a bastard mirth, which hath honey in her mouth, gall in her heart, ...
FRANCIS QUARLES Luxury is an enticing pleasure, a bastard mirth, which hath honey in her mouth, gall in her heart, a...
FRANCIS QUARLES Somewhere in the world there is an epigram for every dilemma.
HENDRIK WILLEM VAN LOON Somewhere in the world there is an epigram for every dilemma
HENDRIK WILLEM VAN LOON Italian wine was something rough and red that came in a straw-covered flask with a candle stuck in i...
NANCY HARMON JENKINS My eyes hurt... but there is something more... I can't stop listening to horror.... now I am going t...
DEYTH BANGER Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed.
BLAISE PASCAL Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed
BLAISE PASCAL Nothing that is good can become stuck – and if it is stuck, it can’t be any good!
SILVIA HARTMANN A joke is an epigram on the death of a feeling.
FREDRICH A joke is an epigram on the death of a feeling.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE There is a throat sting associated with it.
GARY BEAUCHAMP An epigram is a flashlight of a truth; a witticism, truth laughing at itself.
MINNA ANTRIM The taste of blood and that annoying sting of a bitten tongue. Once man got the taste of blood there...
BRANDON GARIC NOTCH There is poison in the fang of the serpent, in the mouth of the fly and in the sting of a scorpion; ...
CHANAKYA An epigram is only a wisecrack that's played at Carnegie Hall.
OSCAR LEVANT The rain forest has Sting. Now Siberia has Jack Dee. Someone had to draw the short straw. In this ca...
JACK DEE Feminine passion is to masculine as an epic is to an epigram.
KARL KRAUS Feminine passion is to masculine as an epic is to an epigram
KARL KRAUS All literature is an effort at the formal character of the epigram.
DELMORE SCHWARTZ An epigram often flashes light into regions where reason shines but dimly.
EDWIN P. WHIPPLE An epigram often flashes light into regions where reason shines but dimly
EDWIN P. WHIPPLE The art of newspaper paragraphing is / to stroke a platitude until it purrs like an epigram.
DON MARQUIS The art of newspaper paragraphing is to stroke a platitude until it purrs like an epigram.
DON MARQUIS …If anything else, all I ever did was love you….
BETH FANTASKEY Every command consists of momentum and sting. The momentum forces the recipient to act, and to act i...
ELIAS CANETTI What is an epigram? a dwarfish whole, Its body brevity, and wit its soul.
UNKNOWN What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole, its body brevity, and wit its soul.
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE What is an epigram? a dwarfish whole, its body brevity, and wit its soul
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.
MARK TWAIN Behold the child, by nature's kindly law, pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
ALEXANDER POPE It was like there's got to be some way to stay working and stay productive in Los Angeles. TV is...
ETHAN SUPLEE Petruchio: Come, come, you wasp; i' faith, you are too angry.
Katherine: If I be waspish, best ...
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE See life as an adventure. There is no security in being feeble. Be brave, be exciting. Be creative. ...
ANE KRSTEVSKA March comes in with an adder's head, and goes out with a peacock's tail.
RICHARD LAWSON GALES Hiding in all the thorns, there is a yellow rose.
BEN OAK Mister Straw hat is going to be an enemy of mine but even a bond of enmity is still a bond.-Trafalga...
EIICHIRō ODA He misses what is meant by epigram - who thinks it only frivolous flimflam
MARCUS AURELIUS If there ever was an 'America's team,' it would be itty-bitty, little Green Bay, stuck w...
FRANK DEFORD There is only one true aristocracy . . . and that is the aristocracy of passionate souls!
TENNESSEE WILLIAMS Keeping a woman to her word is like trying to hold an alligator by its tail.
VIKRANT PARSAI I believe that there is a Matrix and... to be more accurate I am in the Pornography Matrix.
DEYTH BANGER There's an expression in Persian, 'to play with the lion's tail.' I wasn't what ...
GOLSHIFTEH FARAHANI His whole life is an epigram smart, smooth and neatly penned, Plaited quite neat to catch applause, ...
WILLIAM BLAKE Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting.
WILLIAM A. WARD Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting.
WILLIAM ARTHUR WARD Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
ALEXANDER POPE I can't make head or tail of Life. Love is a fine thing, Art is a fine thing, Nature is a fine thing...
WALLACE STEVENS The secret of good writing is to say an old thing in a new way or to say a new thing in an old way.
RICHARD HARDING DAVIS To fear is one thing. To let fear grab you by the tail and swing you around is another.
KATHERINE PATERSON By them there sat the loving pelican, Whose young ones, poison'd by the serpent's sting, With ...
MICHAEL DRAYTON I'm a real pussy cat -- with an iron tail.
RONA BARRETT Irony became the head that bit its tail and then there is no way out.
ALEJANDRO GONZALEZ INARRITU From William of Orange to William Pitt the younger there was but one man without whom English histor...
ALBERT BUSHNELL HART Disruptive innovation is simply doing a common thing in an uncommon way or doing an uncommon thing i...
BRYAN INDIGO --They write here one Cornelius--Son Hath made the Hollanders an invisible eel To swim the hav...
BEN JONSON By going to the den of a lion pearls from the head of an elephant may be obtained; but by visiting t...
CHANAKYA I don't see how an epigram, being a bolt from the blue, with no introduction or cue, ever gets itsel...
WILLIAM JAMES Integrity is not everything, but it is the only thing that matters.
JEFFREY FRY A fly may sting a stately horse and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a hor...
SAMUEL JOHNSON There is apparently no surer way of turning a thing into its opposite than by exaggerating it
ERIC HOFFER There is apparently no surer way of turning a thing into its opposite than by exaggerating it.
ERIC HOFFER Life may change, but it may fly not; Hope may vanish, but can die not; Truth be veiled, but still it...
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY William, an artist is someone who combines a desperate need to be understood with the fiercest love ...
GARTH RISK HALLBERG Commemoration of William Augustus Muhlenberg of New York, Priest, 1877 To put it shortly, the Chu...
WILLIAM TEMPLE When carrying the burden of problems and stress that life seems to endlessly hurtle towards us. We g...
GARY F EVANS... To have hope in an age where hope is very scarce and hurt, jealousy and pain are more prominent is a...
GARY F EVANS... Truth metastasized into lurid fantasy.
F. MULDER But I also think all of the great stories in literature deal with loneliness. Sometimes it's by ...
TOM HANKS In course of time the Brothers Cowper removed the manufacture of their printing machines from London...
JAMES NASMYTH I wanted to tell you that I just--I miss you. And maybe that sounds ridiculous--like we barely know ...
TAMMARA WEBBER There comes a time in the affairs of man when he must take the bull by the tail and face the situati...
W. C. FIELDS A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince; but, one is but an insect, and the other i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse, and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other i...
SAMUEL JOHNSON FIDDLE, n. An instrument to tickle human ears by friction of a horse's tail on the entrails of a cat...
AMBROSE BIERCE If you hold a cat by the tail you learn things you cannot learn any other way.
ANONYMOUS If you hold a cat by the tail you learn things you cannot learn any other way.
MARK TWAIN The noun phrase straw man, now used as a compound adjective as in 'straw-man device, technique o...
WILLIAM SAFIRE Death looses its sting when the epitaph drafted for the tombstone of the departed even by those with...
UCHE OHIA ...he was a scream wrapped up in straw, a little, weak, vicious thing gnashing inside a monstrous fa...
ROBERT MCCAMMON A dog can express more with his tail in minutes than an owner can express with his tongue in hours.
KAREN DAVISON Being with her I feel a pain, like a frozen knife stuck in my chest. An awful pain, but the funny th...
HARUKI MURAKAMI It was a great cross from Ben Strand, and Nick did his thing. We just stuck in there.
DERYCK LIM My weakness has always been to prefer the large intention of an unskilful artist to the trivial inte...
THOMAS HARDY This whole force is utterly demoralized by victory. There seems to be neither head nor tail.
CHARLES FERGUSON SMITH Honey is sweet but bees sting.
FRENCH PROVERB A feeble executive implies a feeble execution of the government.
JOSEPH STORY Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
ROBERT POLLOK Audiences are always better pleased with a smart retort, some joke or epigram, than with any amount ...
CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN There is a whole generation of homebuyers stuck out in far suburbs.
ATSUSHI NAKAJIMA Mind is like a net, drawn by the needles of past and future. Mindfulness is the way for not getting ...
AMIT RAY A straw vote only shows which way the hot air blows.
O. HENRY —and I say you still haven't answered my question, Father Bleu."
"Haven't I, dear lady? I tho...
JOHN JAKES He would stab his best friend for the sake of writing an epigram on his tombstone.
OSCAR WILDE The first scholarly edition of Magna Carta was published by the eminent jurist William Blackstone. I...
NOAM CHOMSKY An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way.
CHARLES BUKOWSKI

More William Cowper

Variety's the very spice of life, That gives it all its flavor.
WILLIAM COWPER Then liberty, like day, Breaks on the soul, and by a flash from Heaven Fires all the faculties...
WILLIAM COWPER 'Tis liberty alone that gives the flower Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume; And we are w...
WILLIAM COWPER Hast thou not learn'd what thou art often told, A truth still sacred, and believed of old, Tha...
WILLIAM COWPER The only amarantine flower on earth Is virtue.
WILLIAM COWPER Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds, Exhilarate the spirit, and restore The tone of langu...
WILLIAM COWPER Nature, exerting an unwearied power, Forms, opens, and gives scent to every flower; Spreads th...
WILLIAM COWPER Nature is a good name for an effect whose cause is God.
WILLIAM COWPER Wisdom and goodness are twin-born, one heart Must hold both sisters, never seen apart.
WILLIAM COWPER Be it a weakness, it deserves some praise, We love the play-place of our early days; The scene...
WILLIAM COWPER He comes, the herald of a noisy world, With spatter'd boots, strapp'd waist, and frozen locks; ...
WILLIAM COWPER How shall I speak thee, or thy power address Thou God of our idolatry, the Press. . . . . ...
WILLIAM COWPER Did Charity prevail, the press would prove A vehicle of virtue, truth, and love.
WILLIAM COWPER He who finds thought that lets us penetrate even a little deeper into the eternal mystery of nature...
WILLIAM COWPER Domestic Happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that hast survived the Fall!
WILLIAM COWPER Thus happiness depends, as Nature shows, Less on exterior things than most suppose.
WILLIAM COWPER The man that hails you Tom or Jack, And proves by thumps upon your back How he esteems your me...
WILLIAM COWPER Here the heart May give a useful lesson to the head, And learning wiser grow without his books...
WILLIAM COWPER How much a dunce that has been sent to roam Excels a dunce that has been kept at home.
WILLIAM COWPER True Charity, a plant divinely nurs'd.
WILLIAM COWPER A self-made man? Yes, and one who worships his creator.
WILLIAM COWPER O, popular applause! what heart of man is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?
WILLIAM COWPER God made the country and man made the town.
WILLIAM COWPER Nature is a good name for an effect whose cause is God.
WILLIAM COWPER The life of ease is a difficult pursuit.
WILLIAM COWPER A fretful temper will divide the closest knot that may be tied, by ceaseless sharp corrosion; a temp...
WILLIAM COWPER The man that hails you Tom or Jack, and proves by thumps upon your back how he esteems your merit, i...
WILLIAM COWPER A man renowned for repartee will seldom scruple to make free with friendship's finest feeling, will ...
WILLIAM COWPER The darkest day, If you live till tomorrow will have past away.
WILLIAM COWPER Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon their knees.
WILLIAM COWPER No wild enthusiast could rest, till half the world like him was possessed.
WILLIAM COWPER Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass, the mere materials with which wisdom builds, till smoothed and ...
WILLIAM COWPER Knowledge is proud that it knows so much; Wisdom is humble that it knows no more.
WILLIAM COWPER Man may dismiss compassion from his heart, but God never will.
WILLIAM COWPER Unless a love of virtue light the flame,
Satire is, more than those he brands, to blame;
He ...
WILLIAM COWPER The path of sorrow and that path alone, leads to a land where sorrow is unknown.
WILLIAM COWPER Forced from home, and all its pleasures, afric coast I left forlorn; to increase a stranger's treasu...
WILLIAM COWPER I pity them greatly, but I must be mum, for how could we do without sugar and rum?
WILLIAM COWPER Absence of occupation is not rest; A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
WILLIAM COWPER Remorse, the fatal egg that pleasure laid.
WILLIAM COWPER Remorse begets reform.
WILLIAM COWPER How much a dunce that has been sent to roam, excels a dunce that has been kept at home.
WILLIAM COWPER It chills my blood to hear the blest Supreme rudely appealed to on each trifling theme.
WILLIAM COWPER Variety is the very spice of life that gives it all its flavour.
WILLIAM COWPER I am monarch of all I survey,
My right there is none to dispute on;
but I wish that I coul...
WILLIAM COWPER Candid and generous and just. Boys care but little whom they trust. An error soon corrected -- for w...
WILLIAM COWPER Man disavows, and Deity disowns me: hell might afford my miseries a shelter; therefore hell keeps he...
WILLIAM COWPER God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the ...
WILLIAM COWPER You told me, I remember, glory, built
On selfish principles, is shame and guilt;
The deeds th...
WILLIAM COWPER Visitors are insatiable devourers of time, and fit only for those who, if they did not visit, would ...
WILLIAM COWPER Fanaticism soberly defined, is the false fire of an over heated mind.
WILLIAM COWPER A fool must now and then be right, by chance.
WILLIAM COWPER Absence from whom we love is worse than death, and frustrates hope severer than despair.
WILLIAM COWPER Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
WILLIAM COWPER Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness c...
WILLIAM COWPER Thus happiness depends, as nature shows, less on exterior things than most suppose.
WILLIAM COWPER The innocent seldom find an uncomfortable pillow.
WILLIAM COWPER When his wife asked him to change clothes to meet the German Ambassador: "If they want to see me, ...
WILLIAM COWPER If most of us are ashamed of shabby clothes and shoddy furniture, let us be more ashamed of shabby ...
WILLIAM COWPER Dress drains our cellar dry, And keeps our larder lean; puts out our fires And introduces hung...
WILLIAM COWPER Detested sport, That owes its pleasures to another's pain.
WILLIAM COWPER But conversation, choose what theme we may, And chiefly when religion leads the way, Should fl...
WILLIAM COWPER Great contest follows, and much learned dust Involves the combatants; each claiming truth, And...
WILLIAM COWPER Give what thou canst, without Thee we are poor; And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.
WILLIAM COWPER Man may dismiss compassion from his heart, but God never will.
WILLIAM COWPER God made the country, and man made the town.
WILLIAM COWPER Thus neither the praise nor the blame is our own.
WILLIAM COWPER Religion! what treasure untold resides in that heavenly word!
WILLIAM COWPER The parson knows enough who knows a Duke.
WILLIAM COWPER No one was ever scolded out of their sins.
WILLIAM COWPER With spots quadrangular of diamond form, Ensanguined hearts, clubs typical of strife, And spad...
WILLIAM COWPER Toil for the brave! The brave that are no more.
WILLIAM COWPER But oars alone can ne'er prevail To reach the distant coast; The breath of Heaven must swell t...
WILLIAM COWPER I pity bashful men, who feel the pain Of fancied scorn and undeserved disdain, And bear the ma...
WILLIAM COWPER The church-going bell.
WILLIAM COWPER How soft the music of those village bells, Falling at interval upon the ear In cadence sweet; ...
WILLIAM COWPER So that the jest is clearly to be seen, Not in the words--but in the gap between; Manner is al...
WILLIAM COWPER Habits of close attention, thinking heads, Become more rare as dissipation spreads, Till autho...
WILLIAM COWPER None but an author knows an author's cares, Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears.
WILLIAM COWPER As creeping ivy clings to wood or stone, And hides the ruin that it feeds upon.
WILLIAM COWPER O Winter! ruler of the inverted year, . . . . I crown thee king of intimate delights, F...
WILLIAM COWPER I am monarch of all I survey, My right there is none to dispute, From the centre all round to ...
WILLIAM COWPER Words pregnant with celestial fire.
WILLIAM COWPER Mountains interposed Make enemies of nations, who had else Like kindred drops been mingled int...
WILLIAM COWPER Without one friend, above all foes, Britannia gives the world repose.
WILLIAM COWPER An inadvertent step may crush the snail That crawls at evening in the public path. But he that...
WILLIAM COWPER Silently as a dream the fabric rose; No sound of hammer or of saw was there.
WILLIAM COWPER Call'd to the temple of impure delight He that abstains, and he alone, does right. If a wish w...
WILLIAM COWPER Whoever keeps an open ear For tattlers will be sure to hear The trumpet of contention.
WILLIAM COWPER Spring hangs her infant blossoms on the trees, Rock'd in the cradle of the western breeze.
WILLIAM COWPER Now let us sing, long live the king.
WILLIAM COWPER We are his, To serve him nobly in the common cause, True to the death, but not to be his slave...
WILLIAM COWPER If hindrances obstruct the way, Thy magnanimity display. And let thy strength be seen: B...
WILLIAM COWPER And Satan trembles when he sees The weakest saint upon his knees.
WILLIAM COWPER England with all thy faults, I love thee still-- My country! and, while yet a nook is left Wh...
WILLIAM COWPER O Popular Applause! what heart of man Is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?
WILLIAM COWPER And prate and preach about what others prove, As if the world and they were hand and glove.
WILLIAM COWPER He would not, with a peremptory tone, Assert the nose upon his face his own.
WILLIAM COWPER Me therefore studious of laborious ease.
WILLIAM COWPER Man on the dubious waves of error toss'd.
WILLIAM COWPER . . . thieves at home must hang; but he that puts Into his overgorged and bloated purse The we...
WILLIAM COWPER There is in souls a sympathy with sounds.
WILLIAM COWPER The sounding jargon of the schools.
WILLIAM COWPER Seek to delight, that they may mend mankind. And, while they captivate, inform the mind.
WILLIAM COWPER Now stir the fire, and close the shudders fast, Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, A...
WILLIAM COWPER Unless a love of virtue light the flame, Satire is, more than those he brands, to blame; He hi...
WILLIAM COWPER But truths on which depends our main concern, That 'tis our shame and misery not to learn, Shi...
WILLIAM COWPER The mind, relaxing into needful sport, Should turn to writers of an abler sort, Whose wit well...
WILLIAM COWPER Once more I would adopt the graver style -- a teacher should be sparing of his smile.
WILLIAM COWPER Could he with reason murmur at his case, Himself sole author of his own disgrace?
WILLIAM COWPER Ever let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home.
WILLIAM COWPER While fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still at home.
WILLIAM COWPER Fanaticism, the false fire of an overheated mind.
WILLIAM COWPER When admirals extoll'd for standing still, Of doing nothing with a deal of skill.
WILLIAM COWPER Oh to have a lodge in some vast wilderness. Where rumors of oppression and deceit, of unsuccessful a...
WILLIAM COWPER Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumour of o...
WILLIAM COWPER How various his employments whom the world Calls idle; and who justly in return Esteems that b...
WILLIAM COWPER An idler is a watch that wants both hands; As useless if it goes as when it stands.
WILLIAM COWPER Where tempests never beat nor billows roar.
WILLIAM COWPER Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length.
WILLIAM COWPER Dream after dream ensues; And still they dream that they shall still succeed; And still are di...
WILLIAM COWPER Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day, Live till to-morrow, will have pass'd away.
WILLIAM COWPER Glory built on selfish principles is shame and guilt.
WILLIAM COWPER Glory, built on selfish principles, is shame and guilt.
WILLIAM COWPER Who loves a garden loves a greenhouse too.
WILLIAM COWPER They whom truth and wisdom lead, can gather honey from a weed.
WILLIAM COWPER The dogs did bark, the children screamed, Up flew the windows all; And every soul bawled out, Well d...
WILLIAM COWPER A glory gilds the sacred page, Majestic like the sun, It gives a light to every age, It ...
WILLIAM COWPER Assail'd by scandal and the tongue of strife, His only answer was a blameless life; And he tha...
WILLIAM COWPER Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs Receive our air, that moment they are free; T...
WILLIAM COWPER All zeal for a reform, that gives offence To peace and charity, is mere pretence.
WILLIAM COWPER A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
WILLIAM COWPER God moves in mysterious ways
His wonders to performs
WILLIAM COWPER That good diffused may more abundant grow.
WILLIAM COWPER . . . glory built On selfish principles is shame and guilt.
WILLIAM COWPER God made bees, and bees made honey, God made man, and man made money, Pride made the devil, an...
WILLIAM COWPER Behind a frowning Providence He hides a smiling face.
WILLIAM COWPER 'Tis Providence alone secures In every change both mine and yours.
WILLIAM COWPER Prison'd in a parlour snug and small, Like bottled wasps upon a southern wall.
WILLIAM COWPER Transforms old print To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes Of gallery critics by a thousan...
WILLIAM COWPER The priest he merry is, and blithe Three-quarters of a year, But oh! it cuts him like a scyth...
WILLIAM COWPER A kick that scarce would move a horse, May kill a sound divine.
WILLIAM COWPER The things that mount the rostrum with a skip, And then skip down again, pronounce a text, Cry...
WILLIAM COWPER He that negotiates between God and man, As God's ambassador, the grand concerns Of judgment an...
WILLIAM COWPER Would I describe a preacher, . . . . I would express him simple, grave, sincere; In doct...
WILLIAM COWPER I venerate the man whose heart is warm, Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life, C...
WILLIAM COWPER There goes the parson, oh illustrious spark! And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk.
WILLIAM COWPER Praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language was his mother-to...
WILLIAM COWPER He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch, Cold and yet cheerful; messenger of grief Perhap...
WILLIAM COWPER There is in souls a sympathy with sounds:
And as the mind is pitch'd the ear is pleased
Wi...
WILLIAM COWPER Where men of judgment creep and feel their way, The positive pronounce without dismay.
WILLIAM COWPER I was a stricken deer that left the herd Long since.
WILLIAM COWPER His mind his kingdom, and his will his law.
WILLIAM COWPER Mercy to him that shows it, is the rule.
WILLIAM COWPER What peaceful hours I once enjoy'd! How sweet their memory still! But they have left an aching...
WILLIAM COWPER Meditation here may think down hours to moments. Here the heart may give a useful lesson to the head...
WILLIAM COWPER O Winter! ruler of the inverted year, . . . I crown thee king of intimate delights, Fireside enjoyme...
WILLIAM COWPER For 'tis a truth well known to most, That whatsoever thing is lost, We seek it, ere it comes t...
WILLIAM COWPER Our wasted oil unprofitably burns, Like hidden lamps in old sepulchral urns.
WILLIAM COWPER Oh, my friend, it's not what they take away from you that counts. It's what you do with what you h...
WILLIAM COWPER 'Twere better to be born a stone Of ruder shape, and feeling none, Than with a tenderness like...
WILLIAM COWPER The earth was made so various, that the mind of desultory man, studious of change, and pleased with ...
WILLIAM COWPER . . . Philologists, who chase A painting syllable through time and space Start it at home, and...
WILLIAM COWPER Fast-anchor'd isle.
WILLIAM COWPER Gloriously drunk, obey the important call.
WILLIAM COWPER All learned, and all drunk!
WILLIAM COWPER Reasoning at every step he treads, Man yet mistakes his way, Whilst meaner things, whom instinct l...
WILLIAM COWPER A hat not much worse for wear.
WILLIAM COWPER His head, Not yet by time completely silver'd o'er, Bespoke him past the bounds of freakish yo...
WILLIAM COWPER Some to the fascination of a name, Surrender judgment hoodwinked.
WILLIAM COWPER Exactness is the sublimity of fools. [Fr., L'exactitude est le sublime des sots.]
WILLIAM COWPER Defend me, therefore, common sense, say From reveries so airy, from the toil Of dropping bucke...
WILLIAM COWPER The solemn fog; significant and budge; A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge.
WILLIAM COWPER Ceremony leads her bigots forth, prepared to fight for shadows of no worth. While truths, on which e...
WILLIAM COWPER He is the freeman whom the truth makes free.
WILLIAM COWPER The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.
WILLIAM COWPER The Frenchman, easy, debonair, and brisk, Give him his lass, his fiddle, and his frisk, Is alw...
WILLIAM COWPER Words learned by rote a parrot may rehearse; but talking is not always to converse, not more distinc...
WILLIAM COWPER 'Tis hard if all is false that I advance
A fool must now and then be right, by chance.
WILLIAM COWPER A life of ease is a difficult pursuit.
WILLIAM COWPER The path of sorrow, and that path alone, Leads to the lands where sorrow is unknown.
WILLIAM COWPER O solitude, where are the charms That sages have seen in thy face? Better dwell in the midst o...
WILLIAM COWPER Oh, for a lodge in some vast wilderness, Some boundless contiguity of shade, Where rumour of o...
WILLIAM COWPER I praise the Frenchman; his remark was shrewd,-- "How sweet, how passing sweet is solitude." B...
WILLIAM COWPER A story, in which native humour reigns, Is often useful, always entertains; A graver fact, enl...
WILLIAM COWPER Words learn'd by rote a parrot may rehearse, But talking is not always to converse, Not more d...
WILLIAM COWPER Variety's the very spice of life, That gives it all its flavour.
WILLIAM COWPER The earth was made so various, that the mind Of desultory man, studious of change And pleased ...
WILLIAM COWPER God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And r...
WILLIAM COWPER His wit invites you by his looks to come, But when you knock, it never is at home.
WILLIAM COWPER Ten thousand casks, Forever dribbling out their base contents, Touch'd by the Midas finger of ...
WILLIAM COWPER Still ending, and beginning still.
WILLIAM COWPER We bear our shades about us; self-deprived Of other screen, the thin umbrella spread, And rang...
WILLIAM COWPER Some boundless contiguity of shade.
WILLIAM COWPER No tree in all the grove but has its charms, Though each its hue peculiar.
WILLIAM COWPER Discourse may want an animated "No"To brush the surface, and to make it flow;But still remember, if ...
WILLIAM COWPER Me howling blasts drive devious, tempest-tossed, / Sails ripped, seams opening wide, and compass los...
WILLIAM COWPER Spare feast! a radish and an egg.
WILLIAM COWPER I was a stricken deer, that left the herd / Long since.
WILLIAM COWPER Away went Gilpin, neck or naught, / Away went hat and wig!
WILLIAM COWPER