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There goes the parson, oh illustrious spark! And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk.

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
Less
Illustrious
Clerk
Clerks
Scarce
Spark
Sparks
Preaching
Goes
Parson

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Go, mark the matchless working of the power That shuts within the seed the future flower Bids these in elegance of form excel. In color these, and those delight the smell Sends nature forth, the daughter of the skies, To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.
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No man can be a patriot on an empty stomach.
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Heaven's harmony is universal love.
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I will venture to assert, that a just translation of any ancient poet in rhyme is impossible. No human ingenuity can be equal to the task of closing every couplet with sounds homotonous, expressing at the same time the full sense, and only the full sense of his original.
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Good sense, good health, good conscience, and good fame,--all these belong to virtue, and all prove that virtue has a title to your love.
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There is in souls a sympathy with sounds.
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Sends Nature forth the daughter of the skies... To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.
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Meditation here may think down hours to moments. Here the heart may give a useful lesson to the head and learning wiser grow without his books.
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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.
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For when was public virtue to be found Where private was not?
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The fall of waters and the song of birds, And hills that echo to the distant berds, Are luxuries excelling all the glare The world can boast, and her chief favorites share.
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A Christian's wit is offensive light, A beam that aids, but never grieves the sight Vig'rous in age as in the flush of youth, 'Tis always active on the side of truth.
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Gardening imparts an organic perspective on the passage of time.
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Where men of judgment creep and feel their way, The positive pronounce without dismay.
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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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We sacrifice to dress till household joys and comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry, and keeps our larder lean.
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O, popular applause! what heart of man is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?
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Sin let loose speaks punishment at hand.
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All truth is precious, if not all divine and what dilates the powers must needs refine.
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Spare feast! a radish and an egg.
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