The collection / 12 fragments

The living archive

Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

SearchTypeTopicEraCulture / collection labelCountry attributionTraditionOrder

Author

Leave empty for every voice. Browse all authors ↗

Culture labels and country attributions follow the source collections; earliest origins may be unknown.

12 results · Page 1 of 1Play this collection ▷

01c. 1627 AD

Shall I, wasting in despair, Die because a woman's fair? Or make pale my cheeks with care, 'Cause another's rosy are? Be she fairer than the day, Or the flowery meads in May, If she be not so to me, What care I how fair she be?

George Wither / quote

02c. 1627 AD

Jack shall pipe and Gill shall dance.

George Wither / quote

03c. 1627 AD

Hang sorrow! care will kill a cat, And therefore let 's be merry.

George Wither / quote

04c. 1627 AD

Though I am young, I scorn to flit On the wings of borrowed wit.

George Wither / quote

05c. 1627 AD

And I oft have heard defended,— Little said is soonest mended.

George Wither / quote

06c. 1627 AD

And he that gives us in these days New Lords may give us new laws.

George Wither / quote

07c. 1627 AD

Persuade them then, Fearless to be resolved to die like men; For want of such a resolution stings At point of death, and dreadful horror brings Ev’n to the soul; ’cause, wanting preparation, She dies, despairing of her own salvation. Yea, and moreover this full well know I, He that’s at any time afraid to die, Is in weak case, and whatsoe’er he saith, Hath but a wavering and a feeble faith.

George Wither / quote

08c. 1627 AD

When with a serious musing I behold The grateful and obsequious marigold; How duly every morning she displays Her open breast. When Titan spreads his rays, How she observes him in his daily walk. Still bending towards him her small slender stalk. For when he down declines, she droops and mourns, Bedew’d as ’twere, with tears till he returns; And how she veils her flowers when he is gone, As if she scorned to be looked on By an inferior eye, or did contemn To wait upon a meaner light than him. When thus I meditate, methinks the flowers Have spirits far more generous than ours; And give us fair examples to despise The servile fawning and idolatries Wherewith we court these earthly things below, Which merit not the service we bestow.

George Wither / quote

09c. 1627 AD

Great Lord of time! Great King of Heav’n, Since weekly Thou renew’st my days, To Thee shall daily thanks be giv’n, And weekly sacrifice of praise. This day the light, time’s eldest born, Her glorious beams did first display, And then the evening and the morn Did first obtain the name of day. Discretion grant me so to know What Sabbath-rites Thou dost require, And grace my duty so to do, That I may keep Thy law entire.

George Wither / quote

10c. 1627 AD

Lord, grant, oh grant me thy compassion, For I in thee my trust have placed; Display thy wings for my salvation, Until my griefs are overpast. To thee I sue, oh God most high, To thee that canst all want supply.

George Wither / quote

11c. 1627 AD

To pray, without devotion, is to prate; And hearing is but half our exercise: We ought not, therefore, to regard alone How often, but how well, the work be done.

George Wither / quote

12c. 1627 AD

Without the door let sorrow lie,And if for cold it hap to die,We'll bury 't in a Christmas pie,And evermore be merry.

George Wither / quote