Quote

But truths on which depends our main concern, That 'tis our shame and misery not to learn, Shine by the side of every path we tread With such a lustre he that runs may read.

William Cowper

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

William Cowper
Age: 68 †
Born: 1731
Born: November 26
Died: 1800
Died: April 25
Hymnwriter
Poet
Poet Lawyer
Translator
Writer
Berkhamsted
Hertfordshire
May
Depends
Shine
Every
Side
Runs
Path
Truths
Sides
Main
Reading
Shining
Read
Misery
Learn
Shame
Lustre
Running
Concern
Tread

More quotes by William Cowper

Image
The still small voice is wanted.
William Cowper
Image
I would not have a slave to till my ground, To carry me, to fan me while I sleep, And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth That sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.
William Cowper
Image
Necessity invented stools, Convenience next suggested elbow-chairs, And luxury the accomplish'd Sofa last.
William Cowper
Image
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
Image
Give what thou canst, without Thee we are poor And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.
William Cowper
Image
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust Him for His grace Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face.
William Cowper
Image
Heaven speed the canvas, gallantly unfurl'd, To furnish and accommodate a world, To give the Pole the produce of the sun, And knit the unsocial climates into one.
William Cowper
Image
A noisy man is always in the right.
William Cowper
Image
The mind, relaxing into needful sport, Should turn to writers of an abler sort, Whose wit well managed, and whose classic style, Give truth a lustre, and make wisdom smile.
William Cowper
Image
We turn to dust, and all our mightiest works die too.
William Cowper
Image
How soft the music of those village bells, Falling at interval upon the ear In cadence sweet now dying all away, Now pealing loud again, and louder still, Clear and sonorous, as the gale comes on! With easy force it opens all the cells Where Memory slept.
William Cowper
Image
They whom truth and wisdom lead, can gather honey from a weed.
William Cowper
Image
Gardening imparts an organic perspective on the passage of time.
William Cowper
Image
The parable of the prodigal son, the most beautiful fiction that ever was invented our Saviour's speech to His disciples, with which He closed His earthly ministrations, full of the sublimest dignity and tenderest affection, surpass everything that I ever read and like the spirit by which they were dictated, fly directly to the heart.
William Cowper
Image
Pleasure admitted in undue degree, enslaves the will, nor leaves the judgment free.
William Cowper
Image
Fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still at home.
William Cowper
Image
Perhaps thou gav'st me, though unseen, a kiss Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss.
William Cowper
Image
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
Image
There is a pleasure in poetic pains / Which only poets know.
William Cowper
Image
Some men make gain a fountain, whence proceeds A stream of liberal and heroic deeds The swell of pity, not to be confined Within the scanty limits of the mind.
William Cowper