Quotes Alexander Pope - page 3
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A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead.
A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.
The character of covetousness, is what a man generally acquires more through some niggardliness or ill grace in little and inconsiderable things, than in expenses of any consequence.
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Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart. One self-approving hour whole years outweighs Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas; And more true joy Marcellus exil'd feels Than Cæsar with a senate at his heels. In parts superior what advantage lies? Tell (for you can) what is it to be wise? 'T is but to know how little can be known; To see all others' faults, and feel our own.
Happy the man whose wish and care a few paternal acres bound, content to breathe his native air in his own ground.
There still remains to mortify a wit The many-headed monster of the pit.
A long, exact, and serious comedy; In every scene some moral let it teach, And, if it can, at once both please and preach.
Those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.
Praise undeserved, is satire in disguise.
Satire's my weapon, but I'm too discreet To run amuck, and tilt at all I meet.
Satire or sense, alas! Can Sporus feel? Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?
I am satisfied to trifle away my time, rather than let it stick by me.
Soft is the strain when zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows; But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, The line too labours, and the words move slow: Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.
Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly, When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky; Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves, When thro' the clouds he drives the trembling doves.
Who combats bravely is not therefore brave, He dreads a death-bed like the meanest slave: Who reasons wisely is not therefore wise,- His pride in reasoning, not in acting lies.
A perfect Judge will read each work of Wit
With the same spirit that its author writ:
Survey the Whole, nor seek slight faults to find
Where nature moves, and rapture warms the mind.
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True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance.
