John Dryden Quotes
1631–1700 England
John Dryden (19 August [O.S. 9 August] 1631 – 12 May [O.S. 1 May] 1700) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate.
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Also known as: Dryden
537 quotes
The base wretch who hoards up all he can
Is praised and call’d a careful thrifty man.
As thy strutting bags with money rise,
The love of gain is of an equal size.
Their standard, planted on the battlement,
Despair and death among the soldiers sent.
Thus fights Ulysses, thus his fame extends;
A formidable man, but to his friends.
He with his sword unsheathed, on pain of life,
Commands both combatants to cease their strife.
His absence from his mother oft he’ll mourn,
And, with his eyes, look wishes to return.
Some souls we see
Grow hard and stiffen with adversity.
Our green youth copies what grey sinners act,
When age commends the fact.
His youth and age
All of a piece throughout, and all divine.
You season still with sports your serious hours,
For age but tastes of pleasures, youth devours.
This advantage youth from age hath won,
As not to be outridden though outrun.
Now leave these joys, unsuiting to thy age,
To a fresh comer, and resign the stage.
Just in the gate
Dwelt pale diseases and repining age.
Beroe but now I left; whom, pined with pain,
Her age and anguish from these rites detain.
Jove, grant me length of life, and years good store
Heap on my bended back.
A look so pale no quartane ever gave;
My dwindled legs seem crawling to a grave.
These are the effects of doting age,
Vain doubts, and idle cares, and over caution.
No fences parted fields, nor marks nor bounds
Distinguish’d acres of litigious grounds.
Apulian farms, for the rich soil admired,
And thy large fields, where falcons may be tired.
Attribution
Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: John Dryden (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.