WCWilliam Cowper

273 collected words

William Cowper

Life dates: 1731 AD — 1800 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. 1765 AD

Doing good, Disinterested good, is not our trade.

William Cowper / quote

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02c. 1765 AD

God made the country, and man made the town.

William Cowper / quote

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03c. 1765 AD

Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness, Some boundless contiguity of shade, Where rumour of oppression and deceit, Of unsuccessful or successful war, Might never reach me more.

William Cowper / quote

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04c. 1765 AD

Mountains interposed Make enemies of nations who had else, Like kindred drops, been mingled into one.

William Cowper / quote

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05c. 1765 AD

I would not have a slave to till my ground, To carry me, to fan me while I sleep And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth That sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.

William Cowper / quote

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06c. 1765 AD

Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs Receive our air, that moment they are free! They touch our country, and their shackles fall.

William Cowper / quote

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07c. 1765 AD

Fast-anchor'd isle.

William Cowper / quote

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08c. 1765 AD

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

William Cowper / quote

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09c. 1765 AD

Presume to lay their hand upon the ark Of her magnificent and awful cause.

William Cowper / quote

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10c. 1765 AD

Praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language was his mother tongue.

William Cowper / quote

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11c. 1765 AD

There is a pleasure in poetic pains Which only poets know.

William Cowper / quote

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12c. 1765 AD

Transforms old print To zigzag manuscript, and cheats the eyes Of gallery critics by a thousand arts.

William Cowper / quote

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13c. 1765 AD

Reading what they never wrote, Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work, And with a well-bred whisper close the scene.

William Cowper / quote

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14c. 1765 AD

Whoe'er was edified, themselves were not.

William Cowper / quote

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15c. 1765 AD

Variety 's the very spice of life.

William Cowper / quote

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16c. 1765 AD

She that asks Her dear five hundred friends.

William Cowper / quote

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17c. 1765 AD

His head, Not yet by time completely silver'd o'er, Bespoke him past the bounds of freakish youth, But strong for service still, and unimpair'd.

William Cowper / quote

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18c. 1765 AD

Domestic happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that has survived the fall!

William Cowper / quote

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19c. 1765 AD

Great contest follows, and much learned dust.

William Cowper / quote

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20c. 1765 AD

From reveries so airy, from the toil Of dropping buckets into empty wells, And growing old in drawing nothing up.

William Cowper / quote

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21c. 1765 AD

How various his employments whom the world Calls idle, and who justly in return Esteems that busy world an idler too!

William Cowper / quote

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22c. 1765 AD

Who loves a garden loves a greenhouse too.

William Cowper / quote

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23c. 1765 AD

I burn to set the imprison'd wranglers free, And give them voice and utterance once again. Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, And while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn Throws up a steamy column, and the cups That cheer but not inebriate wait on each, So let us welcome peaceful evening in.

William Cowper / quote

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24c. 1765 AD

Which not even critics criticise.

William Cowper / quote

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