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.
ABRAHAM COWLEYThe motions strait, and round, and swift, and slow, And short and long, were mixt and woven so, Did in such artful Figures smoothly fall, As made this decent measur’d dance of all. And this is Musick.
More Abraham Cowley Quotes
-
-
Much will always wanting be To him who much desires.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Hope! fortune’s cheating lottery; when for one prize an hundred blanks there be!
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
I would not fear nor wish my fate, but boldly say each night, to-morrow let my sun his beams display, or in clouds hide them; I have lived today.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Gold begets in brethren hate; Gold in families debate; Gold does friendship separate; Gold does civil wars create.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Neither the praise nor the blame is our own.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
What a brave privilege is it to be free from all contentions, from all envying or being envied, from receiving or paying all kinds of ceremonies!
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Vain, weak-built isthmus, which dost proudly rise Up between two eternities!
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
It is a hard and nice subject for a man to speak of himself: it grates his own heart to say anything of disparagement, and the reader’s ear to hear anything of praise from him.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
The getting out of doors is the greatest part of the journey.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Who that has reason, and his smell, Would not among roses and jasmin dwell?
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
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.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
The motions strait, and round, and swift, and slow, And short and long, were mixt and woven so, Did in such artful Figures smoothly fall, As made this decent measur’d dance of all. And this is Musick.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
Books should, not Business, entertain the Light; And Sleep, as undisturb’d as Death, the Night.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
To be a husbandman, is but a retreat from the city; to be a philosopher, from the world; or rather, a retreat from the world, as it is man’s, into the world, as it is God’s.
ABRAHAM COWLEY -
It was not sleep that made him nod, he said, But too great weight and largeness of his head.
ABRAHAM COWLEY