Change in a trice. The lilies and languors of virtue. For the raptures and roses of vice;

Come down and redeem us from virtue,/ Our Lady of Pain.

To say of shame - what is it? Of virtue - we can miss it; Of sin-we can kiss it, And it's no longer sin

Yes, I laugh at all mankind, and the imposition that they dare to practice when they talk of hearts. I laugh at human passions and human cares, vice and virtue, religion and impiety; they are all the result of petty localities, and artificial situation. One physical want, one severe and abrupt lesson from the colorless and shriveled lip of necessity, is worth all the logic of the empty wretches who have presumed to prate it, from Zeno down to Burgersdicius. It silences in a second all the feeble sophistry of conventional life, and ascetical passion.

Virtue practiced to be seen is not real virtue; vice which fears to be seen is real vice

From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be That no life lives for ever; That dead men rise up never; That even the weariest river Winds somewhere safe to sea.