Quote

Reasoning at every step he treads, Man yet mistakes his way, Whilst meaner things, whom instinct leads, Are rarely known to stray.

William Cowper

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William Cowper
Age: 68 †
Born: 1731
Born: November 26
Died: 1800
Died: April 25
Hymnwriter
Poet
Poet Lawyer
Translator
Writer
Berkhamsted
Hertfordshire
Known
Rarely
Every
Intuition
Way
Leads
Treads
Things
Instinct
Meaner
Men
Mistakes
Chakra
Step
Stray
Steps
Whilst
Mistake
Reasoning

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What peaceful hours I once enjoy'd! How sweet their memory still! But they have left an aching void The world can never fill.
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He that has seen both sides of fifty has lived to little purpose if he has no other views of the world than he had when he was much younger.
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The things that mount the rostrum with a skip, And then skip down again, pronounce a text, Cry hem and reading what they never wrote Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work, And with a well-bred whisper close the scene!
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They love the country, and none else, who seek For their own sake its silence and its shade. Delights which who would leave, that has a heart Susceptible of pity, or a mind Cultured and capable of sober thought.
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Perhaps thou gav'st me, though unseen, a kiss Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss.
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Great offices will have great talents, and God gives to every man the virtue, temper, understanding, taste, that lifts him into life, and lets him fall just in the niche he was ordained to fill.
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Built God a church and laughed His word to scorn.
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Nature, exerting an unwearied power, Forms, opens, and gives scent to every flower Spreads the fresh verdure of the field, and leads The dancing Naiads through the dewy meads.
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God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform. He plants his footsteps in the sea, and rides upon the storm.
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Pernicious weed! whose scent the fair annoys, Unfriendly to society's chief joys: Thy worst effect is banishing for hours The sex whose presence civilizes ours.
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Good sense, good health, good conscience, and good fame,--all these belong to virtue, and all prove that virtue has a title to your love.
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The parable of the prodigal son, the most beautiful fiction that ever was invented our Saviour's speech to His disciples, with which He closed His earthly ministrations, full of the sublimest dignity and tenderest affection, surpass everything that I ever read and like the spirit by which they were dictated, fly directly to the heart.
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The innocent seldom find an uncomfortable pillow.
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Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
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Come, evening, once again, season of peace Return, sweet evening, and continue long! Methinks I see thee in the streaky west, With matron step, slow moving, while the night Treads on thy sweeping train one hand employ'd In letting fall the curtain of repose On bird and beast, the other charged for man With sweet oblivion of the cares of day.
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Without one friend, above all foes, Britannia gives the world repose.
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Is base in kind, and born to be a slave.
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What we admire we praise and when we praise, Advance it into notice, that its worth Acknowledged, others may admire it too.
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As if the world and they were hand and glove.
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How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude! But grant me still a friend in my retreat, whom I may whisper, solitude is sweet.
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