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Some people are more nice than wise.

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
Wise
Wisdom
Nice
People

More quotes by William Cowper

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The art of poetry is to touch the passions, and its duty to lead them on the side of virtue.
William Cowper
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Visits are insatiable devourers of time, and fit only for those who, if they did not that, would do nothing.
William Cowper
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The man that hails you Tom or Jack, and proves by thumps upon your back how he esteems your merit, is such a friend, that one had need be very much his friend indeed to pardon or to bear it.
William Cowper
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I venerate the man whose heart is warm, Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life, Coincident, exhibit lucid proof That he is honest in the sacred cause.
William Cowper
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Books are not seldom talismans and spells.
William Cowper
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Words learn'd by rote a parrot may rehearse, But talking is not always to converse, Not more distinct from harmony divine The constant creaking of a country sign.
William Cowper
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Ages elapsed ere Homer's lamp appear'd, And ages ere the Mantuan swan was heard: To carry nature lengths unknown before, To give a Milton birth, ask'd ages more.
William Cowper
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Remorse begets reform.
William Cowper
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When all within is peace How nature seems to smile Delights that never cease The live-long day beguile
William Cowper
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As creeping ivy clings to wood or stone, And hides the ruin that it feeds upon, So sophistry, cleaves close to, and protects Sin's rotten trunk, concealing its defects.
William Cowper
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Transforms old print To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.
William Cowper
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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.
William Cowper
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Pleasure admitted in undue degree, enslaves the will, nor leaves the judgment free.
William Cowper
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God never meant that man should scale the Heavens By strides of human wisdom. In his works, Though wondrous, he commands us in his word To seek him rather where his mercy shines.
William Cowper
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He is the freeman whom the truth makes free, And all are slaves besides.
William Cowper
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But, oh, Thou bounteous Giver of all good, Thou art, of all Thy gifts, Thyself thy crown!
William Cowper
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Habits are soon assumed but when we strive to strip them off, 'tis being flayed alive.
William Cowper
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Is base in kind, and born to be a slave.
William Cowper
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Blind unbelief is sure to err, And scan his work in vain God is his own interpreter, And he will make it plain.
William Cowper
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In indolent vacuity of thought.
William Cowper