Quote

Whoever keeps an open ear For tattlers will be sure to hear The trumpet of contention.

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
Open
Trumpet
Sure
Contention
Trumpets
Gossip
Whoever
Keeps
Ears
Hear

More quotes by William Cowper

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Dejection of spirits, which may have prevented many a man from becoming an author, made me one. I find constant employment necessary, and therefore take care to be constantly employed. . . . When I can find no other occupation, I think and when I think, I am very apt to do it in rhyme.
William Cowper
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The nurse sleeps sweetly, hired to watch the sick, / whom, snoring, she disturbs.
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.
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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.
William Cowper
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Is base in kind, and born to be a slave.
William Cowper
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Laugh at all you trembled at before.
William Cowper
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All we behold is miracle.
William Cowper
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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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I am monarch of all I survey, My right there is none to dispute, From the centre all round to the sea, I am lord of the fowl and the brute.
William Cowper
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Twere better to be born a stone Of ruder shape, and feeling none, Than with a tenderness like mine And sensibilities so fine! Ah, hapless wretch! condemn'd to dwell Forever in my native shell, Ordained to move when others please, Not for my own content or ease But toss'd and buffeted about, Now in the water and now out.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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Events of all sorts creep or fly exactly as God pleases.
William Cowper
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Lord, it is my chief complaint, That my love is weak and faint Yet I love thee and adore, Oh for grace to love thee more!
William Cowper
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And, of all lies (be that one poet's boast) / The lie that flatters I abhor the most.
William Cowper
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The path of sorrow, and that path alone, leads to the land where sorrow is unknown.
William Cowper
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We are never more in danger than when we think ourselves most secure, nor in reality more secure than when we seem to be most in danger.
William Cowper
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We bear our shades about us self-deprived Of other screen, the thin umbrella spread, And range an Indian waste without a tree.
William Cowper
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Grief is itself a medicine.
William Cowper
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How happy it is to believe, with a steadfast assurance, that our petitions are heard even while we are making them and how delightful to meet with a proof of it in the effectual and actual grant of them.
William Cowper
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Forced from home, and all its pleasures, afric coast I left forlorn to increase a stranger's treasures, o the raging billows borne. Men from England bought and sold me, paid my price in paltry gold but, though theirs they have enroll'd me, minds are never to be sold.
William Cowper