Quote

The man that hails you Tom or Jack, and proves by thumps upon your back how he esteems your merit, is such a friend, that one had need be very much his friend indeed to pardon or to bear it.

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
Friend
Jack
Friends
Merit
Upon
Esteem
Hails
Back
Bear
Esteems
Need
Indeed
Hail
Needs
Bears
Proves
Much
Friendship
Toms
Men
Prove
Pardon

More quotes by William Cowper

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Ye therefore who love mercy, teach your sons to love it, too.
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But many a crime deemed innocent on earth Is registered in Heaven and these no doubt Have each their record, with a curse annex'd.
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How fleet is a glance of the mind! Compared with the speed of its flight, The tempest itself lags behind, And the swift-winged arrows of light.
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For 'tis a truth well known to most, That whatsoever thing is lost, We seek it, ere it comes to light, In every cranny but the right.
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Th' embroid'ry of poetic dreams.
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A fool must now and then be right, by chance
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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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The bud may have a bitter taste, But sweet will be the flower.
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Call'd to the temple of impure delight He that abstains, and he alone, does right. If a wish wander that way, call it home He cannot long be safe whose wishes roam.
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Remorse, the fatal egg by pleasure laid, In every bosom where her nest is made, Hatched by the beams of truth, denies him rest, And proves a raging scorpion in his breast.
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With spots quadrangular of diamond form, ensanguined hearts, clubs typical of strife, and spades, the emblems of untimely graves.
William Cowper
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As creeping ivy clings to wood or stone, And hides the ruin that it feeds upon, So sophistry, cleaves close to, and protects Sin's rotten trunk, concealing its defects.
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The earth was made so various, that the mind Of desultory man, studious of change, And pleased with novelty, might be indulged.
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Truth is the golden girdle of the globe.
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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The slaves of custom and established mode, With pack-horse constancy we keep the road Crooked or straight, through quags or thorny dells, True to the jingling of our leader's bells.
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O, popular applause! what heart of man is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?
William Cowper
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They best can judge a poet's worth, Who oft themselves have known The pangs of a poetic birth By labours of their own.
William Cowper
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Man disavows, and Deity disowns me: hell might afford my miseries a shelter therefore hell keeps her ever-hungry mouths all bolted against me.
William Cowper
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Fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still at home.
William Cowper