For they can conquer who believe they can.
JOHN DRYDENFor they can conquer who believe they can.
JOHN DRYDENThe glorious lamp of heaven, the radiant sun, Is Nature’s eye.
JOHN DRYDENYouth, beauty, graceful action seldom fail: But common interest always will prevail; And pity never ceases to be shown To him who makes the people’s wrongs his own.
JOHN DRYDENPoliticians neither love nor hate.
JOHN DRYDENAll empire is no more than power in trust.
JOHN DRYDENSatire is a kind of poetry in which human vices are reprehended.
JOHN DRYDENOur vows are heard betimes! and Heaven takes care To grant, before we can conclude the prayer: Preventing angels met it half the way, And sent us back to praise, who came to pray.
JOHN DRYDENPlots, true or false, are necessary things, To raise up commonwealths and ruin kings.
JOHN DRYDENBold knaves thrive without one grain of sense, But good men starve for want of impudence.
JOHN DRYDENBut when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.
JOHN DRYDENAt home the hateful names of parties cease, And factious souls are wearied into peace.
JOHN DRYDENOur souls sit close and silently within, And their own web from their own entrails spin; And when eyes meet far off, our sense is such, That, spider-like, we feel the tenderest touch.
JOHN DRYDENMerit challenges envy.
JOHN DRYDENWhile I am compassed round With mirth, my soul lies hid in shades of grief, Whence, like the bird of night, with half-shut eyes, She peeps, and sickens at the sight of day.
JOHN DRYDENWe can never be grieved for their miseries who are thoroughly wicked, and have thereby justly called their calamities on themselves.
JOHN DRYDENSecret guilt is by silence revealed.
JOHN DRYDEN