“Those who write ill, and they who ne’er durst write, Turn critics out of mere revenge and spite.”

Be fair, or foul, or rain, or shine, The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine. Not heaven itself upon the past has power; But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.

When I consider life, ’tis all a cheat; Yet, fooled with hope, men favour the deceit; Trust on, and think tomorrow will repay. Tomorrow’s falser than the former day.

Fowls, by winter forced, forsake the floods, and wing their hasty flight to happier lands.

What, start at this! when sixty years have spread. Their grey experience o’er thy hoary head? Is this the all observing age could gain? Or hast thou known the world so long in vain?

Happy, happy, happy pair! None but the brave deserves the fair.

To die for faction is a common evil, But to be hanged for nonsense is the devil.

Truth is the foundation of all knowledge and the cement of all societies.

For all the happiness mankind can gain Is not in pleasure, but in rest from pain.

We by art unteach what Nature taught.

Never was patriot yet, but was a fool.

They first condemn that first advised the ill.

Let grace and goodness be the principal loadstone of thy affections. For love which hath ends, will have an end; whereas that which is founded on true virtue, will always continue.

But when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.

Time glides with undiscover’d haste; The future but a length behind the past.

Self-defense is Nature’s eldest law.

Him of the western dome, whose weighty sense Flows in fit words and heavenly eloquence.