This a scene of changes, and to be constant in Nature were inconstancy.
ABRAHAM COWLEYWhy dost thou heap up wealth, which thou must quit, Or what is worse, be left by it? Why dost thou load thyself when thou ‘rt to fly, Oh, man! ordain’d to die?
More Abraham Cowley Quotes
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As for being much known by sight, and pointed out, I cannot comprehend the honor that lies withal; whatsoever it be, every mountebank has it more than the best doctor.
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When Harvey’s violent passion she did see, Began to tremble and to flee; Took sanctuary, like Daphne, in a tree
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Gold begets in brethren hate; Gold in families debate; Gold does friendship separate; Gold does civil wars create.
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All this world’s noise appears to me a dull, ill-acted comedy!
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Who that has reason, and his smell, Would not among roses and jasmin dwell?
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Man is too near all kinds of beasts,–a fawning dog, a roaring lion, a thieving fox, a robbing wolf, a dissembling crocodile, a treacherous decoy, and a rapacious vulture.
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Begin, be bold, and venture to be wise, He who defers this work from day to day, Does on a river’s bank expecting stay
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Thus would I double my life’s fading space;For he that runs it well, runs twice his race.
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Unbind the charms that in slight fables lie and teach that truth is truest poesy.
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There is some help for all the defects of fortune; for, if a man cannot attain to the length of his wishes, he may have his remedy by cutting of them shorter.
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Books should, not Business, entertain the Light; And Sleep, as undisturb’d as Death, the Night.
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Nothing in Nature’s sober found, But an eternal Health goes round. Fill up the Bowl then, fill it high
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There Daphne’s Lover stopped, and thought it much The very leaves of her to touch: But Harvey, our Apollo, stopp’d not so; Into the Bark and Root he after her did go!
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The spade, the plough-share, and the rake) Arts, in most cruel wise Man’s left to epitomize!
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The present is an eternal now.
ABRAHAM COWLEY