How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude! But grant me still a friend in my retreat, whom I may whisper, solitude is sweet.
WILLIAM COWPERHow sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude! But grant me still a friend in my retreat, whom I may whisper, solitude is sweet.
WILLIAM COWPERTruth is the golden girdle of the globe.
WILLIAM COWPERVice stings us even in our pleasures, but virtue consoles us even in our pains.
WILLIAM COWPERI venerate the man whose heart is warm, Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life, Coincident, exhibit lucid proof That he is honest in the sacred cause.
WILLIAM COWPERJudge not the Lord by feeble sense, But trust Him for His grace; Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face. His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every hour;
WILLIAM COWPERWho loves a garden loves a greenhouse too.
WILLIAM COWPERAnd natural in gesture; much impress’d Himself, as conscious of his awful charge, And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds May feel it too; affectionate in look, And tender in address, as well becomes A messenger of grace to guilty men.
WILLIAM COWPERThere is in souls a sympathy with sounds: And as the mind is pitch’d the ear is pleased With melting airs, or martial, brisk or grave; Some chord in unison with what we hear Is touch’d within us, and the heart replies.
WILLIAM COWPERKnowledge and wisdom, far from being one, Have oft-times no connection.
WILLIAM COWPERThe only amarantine flower on earth Is virtue.
WILLIAM COWPERAbsence of proof is not proof of absence.
WILLIAM COWPERIn a fleshly tomb, I am buried above ground.
WILLIAM COWPERBuilt God a church and laughed His word to scorn.
WILLIAM COWPERJudge not the Lord by feeble sense, But trust him for his grace; Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face.
WILLIAM COWPERWhat is there in the vale of lifeHalf so delightful as a wife;When friendship, love and peace combineTo stamp the marriage-bond divine?
WILLIAM COWPERAbsence of occupation is not rest.
WILLIAM COWPER