Quote

How readily we wish time spent revoked, that we might try the ground again where once--through inexperience, as we now perceive--we missed that happiness we might have found!

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
Happiness
Wish
Revoked
Found
Inexperience
Past
Readily
Might
Missed
Trying
Perceive
Time
Spent
Ground

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To follow foolish precedents, and wink With both our eyes, is easier than to think.
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Tea - the cups that cheer but not inebriate.
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A life of ease is a difficult pursuit.
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Vice stings us even in our pleasures, but virtue consoles us even in our pains.
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Fanaticism, the false fire of an overheated mind.
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Visits are insatiable devourers of time, and fit only for those who, if they did not that, would do nothing.
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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.
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Ever let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home.
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And hast thou sworn on every slight pretence, Till perjuries are common as bad pence, While thousands, careless of the damning sin, Kiss the book's outside, who ne'er look'd within?
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[My kitten's] gambols are not to be described, and would be incredible, if they could.
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Variety's the very spice of life, That gives it all its flavor.
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It is a terrible thought, that nothing is ever forgotten that not an oath is ever uttered that does not continue to vibrate through all times, in the wide spreading current of sound that not a prayer is lisped, that its record is not to be found st
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Manner is all in all, whate'er is writ,The substitute for genius, sense, and wit.
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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.
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She that asks Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all, And hates their coming.
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A teacher should be sparing of his smile.
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Learning itself, received into a mind By nature weak, or viciously inclined, Serves but to lead philosophers astray, Where children would with ease discern the way.
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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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When scandal has new-minted an old lie, Or tax'd invention for a fresh supply, 'Tis call'd a satire, and the world appears Gathering around it with erected ears A thousand names are toss'd into the crowd, Some whisper'd softly, and some twang'd aloud, Just as the sapience of an author's brain, Suggests it safe or dangerous to be plain.
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Forced from home, and all its pleasures, afric coast I left forlorn to increase a stranger's treasures, o the raging billows borne. Men from England bought and sold me, paid my price in paltry gold but, though theirs they have enroll'd me, minds are never to be sold.
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