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Count all th' advantage prosperous Vice attains, 'Tis but what Virtue flies from and disdains: And grant the bad what happiness they would, One they must want--which is, to pass for good.

Alexander Pope

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Alexander Pope
Age: 56 †
Born: 1688
Born: May 21
Died: 1744
Died: May 30
Literary Historian
Poet
Translator
the City
Pope the Poet
Alexander I Pope
Alexander
I Pope
Would
Count
Disdains
Vices
Attains
Pass
Disdain
Advantage
Flies
Virtue
Grant
Happiness
Prosperous
Must
Grants
Good
Vice

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Rogues in rags are kept in countenance by rogues in ruffles.
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Giving advice is many times only the privilege of saying a foolish thing one's self, under the pretense of hindering another from doing one.
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A man of business may talk of philosophy a man who has none may practice it.
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And write about it, Goddess, and about it!
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Such as are still observing upon others are like those who are always abroad at other men's houses, reforming everything there while their own runs to ruin.
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Now hollow fires burn out to black, And lights are fluttering low: Square your shoulders, lift your pack And leave your friends and go. O never fear, lads, naught's to dread, Look not to left nor right: In all the endless road you tread There's nothing but the night.
Alexander Pope
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What some call health, if purchased by perpetual anxiety about diet, isn't much better than tedious disease.
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A little learning is a dangerous thing.
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Know then this truth, enough for man to know virtue alone is happiness below.
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Then from the Mint walks forth the man of rhyme, Happy to catch me, just at dinner-time.
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Fool, 'tis in vain from wit to wit to roam: Know, sense, like charity, begins at home.
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Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath, The clamtrous lapwings feel the leaden death Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare They fall, and leave their little lives in air.
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Hear how the birds, on ev'ry blooming spray, With joyous musick wake the dawning day.
Alexander Pope
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Poets like painters, thus unskilled to trace The naked nature and the living grace, With gold and jewels cover ev'ry part, And hide with ornaments their want of art. True wit is Nature to advantage dressed, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.
Alexander Pope
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On wings of wind came flying all abroad.
Alexander Pope
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Ye flowers that drop, forsaken by the spring, Ye birds that, left by summer, cease to sing, Ye trees that fade, when Autumn heats remove, Say, is not absence death to those who love?
Alexander Pope
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A naked lover bound and bleeding lies!
Alexander Pope
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In various talk th' instructive hours they past, Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last One speaks the glory of the British queen, And one describes a charming Indian screen A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes At every word a reputation dies.
Alexander Pope
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The most positive men are the most credulous, since they most believe themselves, and advise most with their falsest flatterer and worst enemy--their own self-love.
Alexander Pope
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Of little use, the man you may suppose, Who says in verse what others say in prose Yet let me show a poet's of some weight, And (though no soldier) useful to the state, What will a child learn sooner than a song? What better teach a foreigner the tongue? What's long or short, each accent where to place And speak in public with some sort of grace?
Alexander Pope