One cannot say he wanted wit, but rather that he was frugal of it.
Mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out of nature, though everything is altered.
Music, Music for a while Shall all your cares beguile. Alexander’s Feast.
O freedom, first delight of human kind!
I learn to pity woes so like my own.
Second thoughts, they say, are best.
The trumpet’s loud clangor Excites us to arms.
I am reading Jonson’s verses to the memory of Shakespeare; an insolent, sparing, and invidious panegyric...
They, who would combat general authority with particular opinion, must first establish themselves a reputation of understanding better than other men.
And he, who servilely creeps after sense, Is safe, but ne’er will reach an excellence.
But when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.
With odorous oil thy head and hair are sleek; And then thou kemb’st the tuzzes on thy cheek: Of these, my barbers take a costly care.
An hour will come, with pleasure to relate Your sorrows past, as benefits of Fate.
Genius must be born, it can’t be taught.
The winds are out of breath.
Truth is the object of our understanding, as good is of our will; and the understanding can no more be delighted with a lie than the will can choose an apparent evil.
Restless at home, and ever prone to range.
Men’s virtues I have commended as freely as I have taxed their crimes.
For age but tastes of pleasures youth devours.
Some of our philosophizing divines have too much exalted the faculties of our souls, when they have maintained that by their force mankind has been able to find out God.