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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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William Cowper
Age: 68 †
Born: 1731
Born: November 26
Died: 1800
Died: April 25
Hymnwriter
Poet
Poet Lawyer
Translator
Writer
Berkhamsted
Hertfordshire
Best
Poetic
Labour
Judge
Judging
Poet
Birth
Worth
Labours
Known
Pangs

More quotes by William Cowper

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The Cross! There, and there only (though the deist rave, and the atheist, if Earth bears so base a slave) There and there only, is the power to save.
William Cowper
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Anticipated rents, and bills unpaid, Force many a shining youth into the shade, Not to redeem his time, but his estate, And play the fool, but at the cheaper rate.
William Cowper
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The kindest and the happiest pair Will find occasion to forbear And something, every day they live, To pity, and perhaps forgive.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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Truth is the golden girdle of the globe.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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God made the country, and man made the town.
William Cowper
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God made bees, and bees made honey, God made man, and man made money, Pride made the devil, and the devil made sin So God made a cole-pit to put the devil in.
William Cowper
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When one that holds communion with the skies Has fill'd his urn where these pure waters rise, And once more mingles with us meaner things, 'Tis e'en as if an angel shook his wings.
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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A life all turbulence and noise may seem To him that leads it wise and to be praised, But wisdom is a pearl with most success Sought in still waters.
William Cowper
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Still ending, and beginning still.
William Cowper
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Time, as he passes us, has a dove's wing, Unsoil'd, and swift, and of a silken sound.
William Cowper
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How shall I speak thee, or thy power address Thou God of our idolatry, the Press. . . . . Like Eden's dead probationary tree, Knowledge of good and evil is from thee.
William Cowper
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Books are not seldom talismans and spells.
William Cowper
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No tree in all the grove but has its charms, Though each its hue peculiar.
William Cowper
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[My kitten's] gambols are not to be described, and would be incredible, if they could.
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.
William Cowper
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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