Skip to content

Thomas Percy Quotes

1729–1811 England

Thomas Percy (13 April 1729 – 30 September 1811) was a bishop and magazine editor. His Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) was the first of the great ballad collections, though he may have written some of it himself based on ballad fragments.

England
Anthologists
Editors
Poets

Also known as: Percy, Thomas, Thomas Percy

Random Thomas Percy quote

14 quotes

He that had neither beene kithe nor kin,
Might have seene a full fayre sight.

Everye white will have its blacke,
And everye sweet its soure.

He that wold not when he might,
He shall not when he wold-a.

He that would not when he might,
He shall not when he wolda.

Weep no more, lady, weep no more,
Thy sorrowe is in vaine,
For violets pluckt, the sweetest showers
Will ne'er make grow againe.

Balow, my babe, lye still and sleipe,
It grieves me sair to see thee weipe.

Over the mountains,
And over the waves,
Over the fountains,
And under the graves;
Over the floods that are deepest,
Which do Neptune obey;
Over the rocks that are steepest,
Love will find out the way.

Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765)

Late, late yestreen I saw the new moone,
Wi' the auld moon in hir arme.

O lady, he is dead and gone!
Lady, he's dead and gone!
And at his head a green grass turfe,
And at his heels a stone.

It was a friar of orders grey
Walked forth to tell his beads.

"What is thy name, faire maid?" quoth he.
"Penelophon, O King," quoth she.

He was a wight of high renowne,
And thosne but of a low degree:
Itt's pride that putts the countrye downe,
Man, take thine old cloake about thee.

Shall I bid her goe? what and if I doe?
Shall I bid her goe and spare not?
Oh no, no, no, I dare not.

King Stephen was a worthy peere,
His breeches cost him but a crowne;
He held them sixpence all too deere,
Therefore he call'd the taylor lowne.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Percy (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.