For all the happiness mankind can gain Is not in pleasure, but in rest from pain.
JOHN DRYDENFor all the happiness mankind can gain Is not in pleasure, but in rest from pain.
JOHN DRYDENPride – Lord of human kind.
JOHN DRYDENWe must beat the iron while it is hot, but we may polish it at leisure.
JOHN DRYDENAt home the hateful names of parties cease, And factious souls are wearied into peace.
JOHN DRYDENAnd that the Scriptures, though not everywhere Free from corruption, or entire, or clear, Are uncorrupt, sufficient, clear, entire In all things which our needful faith require.
JOHN DRYDENEvery language is so full of its own proprieties that what is beautiful in one is often barbarous, nay, sometimes nonsense, in another.
JOHN DRYDENNone but the brave deserve the fair.
JOHN DRYDENHappy the man, and happy he alone, he who can call today his own; he who, secure within, can say, tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
JOHN DRYDENPlots, true or false, are necessary things, To raise up commonwealths and ruin kings.
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 DRYDENThree poets, in three distant ages born, Greece, Italy, and England did adorn. The first in loftiness of thought surpass’d; The next, in majesty; in both the last. The force of Nature could no further go; To make a third, she join’d the former two.
JOHN DRYDENSince a true knowledge of nature gives us pleasure, a lively imitation of it, either in poetry or painting, must produce a much greater; for both these arts are not only true imitations of nature, but of the best nature.
JOHN DRYDENCourage from hearts and not from numbers grows.
JOHN DRYDENFaith is to believe what you do not yet see: the reward for this faith is to see what you believe. Thus all below is strength, and all above is grace.
JOHN DRYDENFor what can power give more than food and drink, To live at ease, and not be bound to think?
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 DRYDEN