252 quotes
A narrow isthmus betwixt time and eternity.
The man that blushes is not quite a brute.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
And all may do what has by man been done.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
A Christian is the highest style of man.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
The knell, the shroud, the mattock, and the grave,
The deep damp vault, the darkness and the worm.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
Man of the World (for such wouldst thou be called)—
And art thou proud of that inglorious style?
Much learning shows how little mortals know;
Much wealth, how little worldlings can enjoy.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
Heaven’s Sovereign saves all beings but himself
That hideous sight,—a naked human heart.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
How empty learning, and how vain is art,
But as it mends the life, and guides the heart!
A foe to God was ne'er true friend to man,
Some sinister intent taints all he does.
Beware what earth calls happiness; beware
All joys, but joys that never can expire.
Where nature's end of language is declined,
And men talk only to conceal the mind.
Ah, how unjust to Nature and himself
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man!
Night-Thoughts (1742)
On every thorn, delightful wisdom grows,
In every rill a sweet instruction flows.
Body and soul, like peevish man and wife,
United jar, and yet are loth to part.
Life is the desert, life the solitude;
Death joins us to the great majority.
Be wise to-day; 'tis madness to defer;
Next day the fatal precedent will plead;
Thus on, till wisdom is push'd out of life.
Time flies, death urges, knells call, Heaven invites,
Hell threatens.
Night-Thoughts (1742)
Affliction is the good man's shining scene;
Prosperity conceals his brightest ray;
As night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.
Be wise with speed;
A fool at forty is a fool indeed.
Love of Fame (1725)