Quote

A story, in which native humour reigns, Is often useful, always entertains A graver fact, enlisted on your side, May furnish illustration, well applied But sedentary weavers of long tales Give me the fidgets, and my patience fails.

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
May
Side
Fails
Entertains
Wells
Sides
Reign
Weavers
Well
Story
Humour
Enlisted
Giving
Fact
Native
Sedentary
Long
Often
Tales
Furnish
Always
Facts
Useful
Reigns
Stories
Patience
Illustration
Give
Failing
Applied
Graver

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Transforms old print To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.
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Some people are more nice than wise.
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If hindrances obstruct the way, Thy magnanimity display. And let thy strength be seen: But O, if Fortune fill thy sail With more than a propitious gale, Take half thy canvas in.
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Sin let loose speaks punishment at hand.
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Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa around, And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn Throws up a steamy column, and the cups That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each, So let us welcome peaceful evening in
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Even in the stifling bosom of the town, A garden, in which nothing thrives, has charms That soothes the rich possessor much consol'd, That here and there some sprigs of mournful mint, Or nightshade, or valerian, grace the well He cultivates.
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Great offices will have great talents.
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Remorse, the fatal egg that pleasure laid.
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Acquaint thyself with God, if thou would'st taste His works. Admitted once to his embrace, Thou shalt perceive that thou was blind before: Thine eye shall be instructed and thine heart Made pure shall relish with divine delight Till then unfelt, what hands divine have wrought.
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Call'd to the temple of impure delight He that abstains, and he alone, does right. If a wish wander that way, call it home He cannot long be safe whose wishes roam.
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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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Some to the fascination of a name, Surrender judgment hoodwinked.
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There goes the parson, oh illustrious spark! And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk.
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In the vast, and the minute, we see The unambiguous footsteps of the God, Who gives its lustre to an insect's wing And wheels His throne upon the rolling worlds.
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Most satirists are indeed a public scourge Their mildest physic is a farrier's purge Their acrid temper turns, as soon as stirr'd, The milk of their good purpose all to curd. Their zeal begotten, as their works rehearse, By lean despair upon an empty purse.
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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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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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No wisdom that she may gain by experience and reflection hereafter, will compensate the loss of her present hilarity.
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To trace in Nature's most minute design The signature and stamp of power divine. ... The Invisible in things scarce seen revealed, To whom an atom is an ample field.
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Absence of occupation is not rest A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
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