Erasmus Darwin

Life dates: 1731 AD — 1802 AD

Listed in the author section of Bartlett’s ninth-edition anthology, in the linked 1905 printing. Dates reflect that historical edition and may differ from modern scholarship.

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Quotations and sayings

01c. 1766 AD

Soon shall thy arm, unconquer'd steam! afar Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car; Or on wide-waving wings expanded bear The flying chariot through the field of air.

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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02c. 1766 AD

No radiant pearl which crested Fortune wears, No gem that twinkling hangs from Beauty's ears, Not the bright stars which Night's blue arch adorn, Nor rising suns that gild the vernal morn, Shine with such lustre as the tear that flows Down Virtue's manly cheek for others' woes.

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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03c. 1766 AD

The new-born May, As cradled yet in April's lap she lay. Born in yon blaze of orient sky, Sweet May! thy radiant form unfold, Unclose thy blue voluptuous eye, And wave thy shadowy locks of gold.

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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04c. 1766 AD

Birth after birth the line unchanging runs,And fathers live transmitted in their sons;Each passing year beholds the unvarying kinds,The same their manners, and the same their minds:Till, as erelong successive buds decay,And insect-shoals successive pass away,Increasing wants the pregnant parent vexWith the fond wish to form a softer sex. ..

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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05c. 1766 AD

Till o'er the wreck, emerging from the storm, Immortal Nature lifts her changeful form: Mounts from her funeral pyre on wings of flame, And soars and shines, another and the same.

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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06c. 1766 AD

The mass starts into a million suns;Earths round each sun with quick explosions burst,And second planets issue from the first.[The first concept of a 'big bang' theory of the universe.]

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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07c. 1766 AD

This compassion, or sympathy with the pains of others, ought also to extend to the brute creation, as far as our necessities will admit; for we cannot exist long without the destruction of other animal or vegetable beings either in their mature or embryon state. Such is the condition of mortality, that the first law of nature is 'eat, or be eaten.' Hence for the preservation of our existence we may be supposed to have a natural right to kill those brute creatures, which we want to eat, or which want to eat us; but to destroy even insects wantonly shows an unreflecting mind, or a depraved heart.

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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08c. 1766 AD

Such is the condition of organic nature! whose first law might be expressed in the words 'Eat or be eaten!' and which would seem to be one great slaughter-house, one universal scene of rapacity and injustice!

Erasmus Darwin / quote

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