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Habits are soon assumed but when we strive to strip them off, 'tis being flayed alive.

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
Alive
Flayed
Strip
Assumed
Habits
Strive
Soon
Habit

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I would not enter on my list of friends (Though graced with polished manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
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Oh, popular applause! what heart of man Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms? The wisest and the best feel urgent need Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales But swell'd into a gust--who then, alas! With all his canvas set, and inexpert, And therefore, heedless, can withstand thy power?
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If a great man struggling with misfortunes is a noble object, a little man that despises them is no contemptible one.
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Philologists, who chase A painting syllable through time and space Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark, To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah's Ark.
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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.
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How! leap into the pit our life to save? To save our life leap all into the grave.
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But conversation, choose what theme we may, And chiefly when religion leads the way, Should flow, like waters after summer show'rs, Not as if raised by mere mechanic powers.
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No, Freedom has a thousand charms to show That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.
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Religion Caesar never knew Thy posterity shall sway, Where his eagles never flew, None as invincible as they.
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Thus happiness depends, as nature shows, less on exterior things than most suppose.
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And in that hour, The seeds of cruelty, that since have swell'd To such gigantic and enormous growth, Were sown in human nature's fruitful soil. Hence date the persecution and the pain That man inflicts on all inferior kinds, Regardless of their plaints.
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Skins may differ, but affection Dwells in white and black the same.
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He that runs may read.
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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.
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With spots quadrangular of diamond form, ensanguined hearts, clubs typical of strife, and spades, the emblems of untimely graves.
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Defend me, therefore, common sense, say From reveries so airy, from the toil Of dropping buckets into empty wells, And growing old in drawing nothing up.
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I have a kitten,the drollest of all creatures that ever wore a cat's skin.
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A heretic, my dear sir, is a fellow who disagrees with you regarding something neither of you knows anything about.
William Cowper
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For when was public virtue to be found Where private was not?
William Cowper
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My soul is sick with every day's report of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled.
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