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Acquaintance I would have, but when it depends not on number, but the choice of friends.

Abraham Cowley

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Abraham Cowley
Age: 49 †
Born: 1618
Born: January 1
Died: 1667
Died: July 28
Essayist
Playwright
Poet
Prosaist
the City
Choices
Friends
Would
Acquaintance
Friendship
Number
Choice
Depends
Numbers

More quotes by Abraham Cowley

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Ah, yet, e'er I descend to th' grave, May I a small House and a large Garden have. And a few Friends, and many Books both true, Both wise, and both delightful too. And since Love ne'er will from me flee, A mistress moderately fair, And good as Guardian angels are, Only belov'd and loving me.
Abraham Cowley
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Does not the passage of Moses and the Israelites into the Holy Land yield incomparably more poetic variety than the voyages of Ulysses or Aeneas?
Abraham Cowley
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To be a husbandman, is but a retreat from the city to be a philosopher, from the world or rather, a retreat from the world, as it is man's, into the world, as it is God's.
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Life is an incurable disease.
Abraham Cowley
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Solitude can be used well by very few people. They who do must have a knowledge of the world to see the foolishness of it, and enough virtue to despise all the vanity.
Abraham Cowley
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Why dost thou heap up wealth, which thou must quit, Or what is worse, be left by it? Why dost thou load thyself when thou 'rt to fly, Oh, man! ordain'd to die? Why dost thou build up stately rooms on high, Thou who art under ground to lie? Thou sow'st and plantest, but no fruit must see, For death, alas! is reaping thee.
Abraham Cowley
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Come, my best Friends! my Books! and lead me on.
Abraham Cowley
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As for being much known by sight, and pointed out, I cannot comprehend the honor that lies withal whatsoever it be, every mountebank has it more than the best doctor.
Abraham Cowley
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Gold begets in brethren hate Gold in families debate Gold does friendship separate Gold does civil wars create.
Abraham Cowley
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What a brave privilege is it to be free from all contentions, from all envying or being envied, from receiving or paying all kinds of ceremonies!
Abraham Cowley
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The world's a scene of changes.
Abraham Cowley
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Nothing in Nature's sober found, But an eternal Health goes round. Fill up the Bowl then, fill it high-- Fill all the Glasses there for why Should every Creature Drink but I? Why, Man of Morals, tell me why?
Abraham Cowley
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All the world's bravery that delights our eyes is but thy several liveries.
Abraham Cowley
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The present is all the ready money Fate can give.
Abraham Cowley
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His faith, perhaps, in some nice tenets might Be wrong his life, I'm sure, was in the right.
Abraham Cowley
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Build yourself a book-nest to forget the world without.
Abraham Cowley
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Nothing is there to come, and nothing past, But an eternal Now does always last.
Abraham Cowley
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Much will always wanting be To him who much desires.
Abraham Cowley
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Man is too near all kinds of beasts,--a fawning dog, a roaring lion, a thieving fox, a robbing wolf, a dissembling crocodile, a treacherous decoy, and a rapacious vulture.
Abraham Cowley
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Books should, not Business, entertain the Light And Sleep, as undisturb'd as Death, the Night.
Abraham Cowley