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... where the Greeks had modesty, we have cant where they had poetry, we have cant where they had patriotism, we have cant where they had anything that exalts, delights, or adorns humanity, we have nothing but cant, cant, cant.

Thomas Love Peacock

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Thomas Love Peacock
Age: 80 †
Born: 1785
Born: October 18
Died: 1866
Died: January 23
Novelist
Poet
Prosaist
Writer
Weymouth
Dorset
Patriotism
Greek
Adorns
Delight
Exalts
England
Greeks
Poetry
Delights
Humanity
Insulting
Anything
Cant
Nothing
Modesty

More quotes by Thomas Love Peacock

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The juice of the grape is the liquid quintessence of concentrated sunbeams.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Tea, late dinners and the French Revolution. I cannot exactly see the connection of ideas.
Thomas Love Peacock
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In a bowl to sea went wise men three, On a brilliant night of June: They carried a net, and their hearts were set On fishing up the moon.
Thomas Love Peacock
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But still my fancy wanders free Through that which might have been.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Death comes to all. His cold and sapless hand Waves o'er the world, and beckons us away. Who shall resist the summons?
Thomas Love Peacock
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Laughter ispleasant, butthe exertion istoomuchfor me.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Man yields to death and man's sublimest works Must yield at length to Time.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Clouds on clouds, in volumes driven, curtain round the vault of heaven.
Thomas Love Peacock
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The critic does his utmost to blight genius in its infancy that which rises in spite of him he will not see and then he complains of the decline of literature.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Seamen three! what men be ye? Gotham's three Wise Men we be. Whither in your bowl so free? To rake the moon from out the sea. The bowl goes trim. The moon doth shine, And our ballast is old wine.
Thomas Love Peacock
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The highest wisdom and the highest genius have been invariably accompanied with cheerfulness. We have sufficient proofs on record that Shakespeare and Socrates were the most festive companions.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Laughter is pleasant, but the exertion at my age is too much for me.
Thomas Love Peacock
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They have poisoned the Thames and killed the fish in the river. A little further development of the same wisdom and science will complete the poisoning of the air, and kill the dwellers on the banks. I almost think it is the destiny of science to exterminate the human race.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Nothing can be more obvious than that all animals were created solely and exclusively for the use of man.
Thomas Love Peacock
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How troublesome is day! It calls us from our sleep away It bids us from our pleasant dreams awake, And sends us forth to keep or break Our promises to pay. How troublesome is day!
Thomas Love Peacock
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I never failed to convince an audience that the best thing they could do was to go away.
Thomas Love Peacock
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I like the immaterial world. I like to live among thoughts and images of the past and the possible, and even of the impossible, now and then.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Not drunk is he who from the floor - Can rise alone and still drink more But drunk is They, who prostrate lies, Without the power to drink or rise.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Names are changed more readily than doctrines, and doctrines more readily than ceremonies.
Thomas Love Peacock
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Time is lord of thee: Thy wealth, thy glory, and thy name are his.
Thomas Love Peacock