Quote

In man or woman, but far most in man, And most of all in man that ministers, And serves the altar, in my soul I loathe All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn: Object of my implacable disgust.

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
Woman
Altars
Soul
Scorn
Men
Serves
Implacable
Disgusting
Affectation
Ministers
Clergymen
Object
Disgust
Objects
Altar
Perfect
Loathe

More quotes by William Cowper

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The spleen is seldom felt where Flora reigns The low'ring eye, the petulance, the frown, And sullen sadness, that o'ershade, distort, And mar the face of beauty, when no cause For such immeasurable woe appears These Flora banishes, and gives the fair Sweet smiles, and bloom less transient than her own.
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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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Some people are more nice than wise.
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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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Where thou art gone, adieus and farewells are a sound unknown.
William Cowper
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To impute our recovery to medicine, and to carry our view no further, is to rob God of His honor, and is saying in effect that He has parted with the keys of life and death, and, by giving to a drug the power to heal us, has placed our lives out of His own reach.
William Cowper
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Hast thou not learnd what thou art often told, A truth still sacred, and believed of old, That no success attends on spears and swords Unblest, and that the battle is the Lords?
William Cowper
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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
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Sin let loose speaks punishment at hand.
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Pleasure admitted in undue degree, enslaves the will, nor leaves the judgment free.
William Cowper
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Vice stings us even in our pleasures, but virtue consoles us even in our pains.
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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She that asks Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all, And hates their coming.
William Cowper
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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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Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.
William Cowper
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The beggarly last doit.
William Cowper
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Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
William Cowper
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Dejection of spirits, which may have prevented many a man from becoming an author, made me one. I find constant employment necessary, and therefore take care to be constantly employed. . . . When I can find no other occupation, I think and when I think, I am very apt to do it in rhyme.
William Cowper
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Religion Caesar never knew Thy posterity shall sway, Where his eagles never flew, None as invincible as they.
William Cowper
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In a fleshly tomb, I am buried above ground.
William Cowper