Best 311 quotes of William Cowper on MyQuotes

Call'd to the temple of impure delight He that abstains, and he alone, does right. If a wish wander that way, call it home; He cannot long be safe whose wishes roam.

Ceremony leads her bigots forth, prepared to fight for shadows of no worth. While truths, on which eternal things depend, can hardly find a single friend.

Come, evening, once again, season of peace; Return, sweet evening, and continue long! Methinks I see thee in the streaky west, With matron step, slow moving, while the night Treads on thy sweeping train; one hand employ'd In letting fall the curtain of repose On bird and beast, the other charged for man With sweet oblivion of the cares of day.

Could he with reason murmur at his case, Himself sole author of his own disgrace?

Defend me, therefore, common sense, say From reveries so airy, from the toil Of dropping buckets into empty wells, And growing old in drawing nothing up.

Dejection of spirits, which may have prevented many a man from becoming an author, made me one. I find constant employment necessary, and therefore take care to be constantly employed. . . . When I can find no other occupation, I think; and when I think, I am very apt to do it in rhyme.

Detested sport, That owes its pleasures to another's pain.

Did Charity prevail, the press would prove A vehicle of virtue, truth, and love.

Domestic happiness, thou only bliss Of paradise that has surviv'd the fall!

E'er since, by faith, I saw the stream thy flowing wounds supply, redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.

Elegant as simplicity, and warm As ecstasy.

England with all thy faults, I love thee still-- My country! and, while yet a nook is left Where English minds and manners may be found, Shall be constrained to love thee.

England, with all thy faults I love thee still, My country!

Ever let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home.

Even in the stifling bosom of the town, A garden, in which nothing thrives, has charms That soothes the rich possessor; much consol'd, That here and there some sprigs of mournful mint, Or nightshade, or valerian, grace the well He cultivates.

Events of all sorts creep or fly exactly as God pleases.

Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.

Fanaticism, the false fire of an overheated mind.

Fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still at home.

Fashion, leader of a chatt'ring train, Whom man for his own hurt permits to reign Who shifts and changes all things but his shape, And would degrade her vot'ry to an ape, The fruitful parent of abuse and wrong, Holds a usurp'd dominion o'er his tongue, There sits and prompts him with his own disgrace, Prescribes the theme, the tone, and the grimace, And when accomplish'd in her wayward school, Calls gentleman whom she has made a fool.

Fate steals along with silent tread, Found oftenest in what least we dread; Frowns in the storm with angry brow, But in the sunshine strikes the blow.

Folly ends where genuine hope begins.

Forced from home, and all its pleasures, afric coast I left forlorn; to increase a stranger's treasures, o the raging billows borne. Men from England bought and sold me, paid my price in paltry gold; but, though theirs they have enroll'd me, minds are never to be sold.

Forgot the blush that virgin fears impart To modest cheeks, and borrowed one from art.

For 'tis a truth well known to most, That whatsoever thing is lost, We seek it, ere it comes to light, In every cranny but the right.

Gardening imparts an organic perspective on the passage of time.

Give what thou canst, without Thee we are poor; And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.

Glory, built on selfish principles, is shame and guilt.

God forbid that Judges upon their oath should make resolutions to enlarge jurisdiction.

God moves in mysterious ways His wonders to performs

God made bees, and bees made honey, God made man, and man made money, Pride made the devil, and the devil made sin; So God made a cole-pit to put the devil in.

God made the country, and man made the town.

God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. Deep in unfathomable mines Of never failing skill He treasures up his bright designs, And works his sovereign will. Ye fearful saints fresh courage take, The clouds ye so much dread Are big with mercy, and shall break In blessings on your head. Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, But trust him for his grace; Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face.

God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform. He plants his footsteps in the sea, and rides upon the storm.

God never meant that man should scale the Heavens By strides of human wisdom. In his works, Though wondrous, he commands us in his word To seek him rather where his mercy shines.

Go, mark the matchless working of the power That shuts within the seed the future flower; Bids these in elegance of form excel. In color these, and those delight the smell; Sends nature forth, the daughter of the skies, To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.

Good sense, good health, good conscience, and good fame,--all these belong to virtue, and all prove that virtue has a title to your love.

Great contest follows, and much learned dust Involves the combatants; each claiming truth, And truth disclaiming both.

Greece, sound, thy Homer's, Rome thy Virgil's name, But England's Milton equals both in fame.

Grief is itself a medicine.

Habits are soon assumed; but when we strive to strip them off, 'tis being flayed alive.

Happy the man who sees a God employed in all the good and ills that checker life.

Hast thou not learnd what thou art often told, A truth still sacred, and believed of old, That no success attends on spears and swords Unblest, and that the battle is the Lords?

Heaven's harmony is universal love.

Heaven speed the canvas, gallantly unfurl'd, To furnish and accommodate a world, To give the Pole the produce of the sun, And knit the unsocial climates into one.

He finds his fellow guilty of a skin Not color'd like his own, and having pow'r T' enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.

He that attends to his interior self, That has a heart, and keeps it; has a mind That hungers, and supplies it; and who seeks A social, not a dissipated life, Has business.

He that has seen both sides of fifty has lived to little purpose if he has no other views of the world than he had when he was much younger.

He that negotiates between God and man, As God's ambassador, the grand concerns Of judgment and of mercy, should beware Of lightness in his speech.

He that runs may read.