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Strength may wield the ponderous spade, May turn the clod, and wheel the compost home But elegance, chief grace the garden shows, And most attractive, is the fair result Of thought, the creature of a polished mind.

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
Results
Fair
Gardening
Clod
Turns
Essentials
Wheel
Ponderous
Shows
Result
Chief
Compost
Thought
Garden
Wheels
Spade
Home
Creatures
Chiefs
Wield
May
Strength
Creature
Spades
Mind
Grace
Attractive
Polished
Turn
Fairs
Elegance

More quotes by William Cowper

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Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
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Nature is a good name for an effect whose cause is God.
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Misery still delights to trace Its semblance in another's case.
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Did Charity prevail, the press would prove A vehicle of virtue, truth, and love.
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Tea - the cups that cheer but not inebriate.
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War's a game, which, were their subjects wise, Kings would not play at.
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Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass, the mere materials with which wisdom builds, till smoothed and squared and fitted to its place, does but encumber whom it seems to enrich. Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much wisdom is humble that he knows no more.
William Cowper
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The Frenchman, easy, debonair, and brisk, Give him his lass, his fiddle, and his frisk, Is always happy, reign whoever may, And laughs the sense of mis'ry far away.
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Visits are insatiable devourers of time, and fit only for those who, if they did not that, would do nothing.
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Sacred interpreter of human thought, How few respect or use thee as they ought! But all shall give account of every wrong, Who dare dishonor or defile the tongue Who prostitute it in the cause of vice, Or sell their glory at a market-price!
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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The only amarantine flower on earth Is virtue.
William Cowper
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A fretful temper will divide the closest knot that may be tied, by ceaseless sharp corrosion a temper passionate and fierce may suddenly your joys disperse at one immense explosion.
William Cowper
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If my resolution to be a great man was half so strong as it is to despise the shame of being a little one.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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Elegant as simplicity, and warm As ecstasy.
William Cowper
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He that attends to his interior self, That has a heart, and keeps it has a mind That hungers, and supplies it and who seeks A social, not a dissipated life, Has business.
William Cowper
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But oars alone can ne'er prevail To reach the distant coast The breath of Heaven must swell the sail, Or all the toil is lost.
William Cowper
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Tis pleasant, through the loopholes of retreat, To peep at such a world to see the stir Of the Great Babel, and not feel the crowd.
William Cowper
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All flesh is grass. and all its glory fades Like the fair flower dishevell'd in the wind Riches have wings, and grandeur is a dream The man we celebrate must find a tomb, And we that worship him, ignoble graves.
William Cowper