Alexander Pope
Alexander Pope
Alexander Popewas an 18th-century English poet. He is best known for his satirical verse, as well as for his translation of Homer. Famous for his use of the heroic couplet, he is the second-most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth21 May 1688
men noses littles
Praise is like ambergrease: a little whiff of it, and by snatches, is very agreeable; but when a man holds a whole lump of it to your nose, it is a stink, and strikes you down.
character people bird
It often happens that those are the best people whose characters have been most injured by slanderers: as we usually find that to be the sweetest fruit which the birds have been picking at.
husband women dragons
A man who admires a fine woman, has yet not more reason to wish himself her husband, than one who admired the Hesperian fruit, would have had to wish himself the dragon that kept it.
kings women character
Two women seldom grow intimate but at the expense of a third person; they make friendships as kings of old made leagues, who sacrificed some poor animal betwixt them, and commenced strict allies; so the ladies, after they have pulled some character to pieces, are from henceforth inviolable friends.
sex women tragedy
It is observable that the ladies frequent tragedies more than comedies; the reason may be, that in tragedy their sex is deified and adored, in comedy exposed and ridiculed.
soul superstitions spleen
Superstition is the spleen of the soul.
blessing heaven soul
Heaven breathes thro' ev'ry member of the whole One common blessing, as one common soul.
science growth sake
To observations which ourselves we make, we grow more partial for th' observer's sake.
beauty eye joints
'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call, But the joint force and full result of all.
hate faults hate-him
Whoe'er he be That tells my faults, I hate him mortally.
men world good-nature
A good-natured man has the whole world to be happy out of.
merit peculiar care
The good must merit God's peculiar care; But who but God can tell us who they are?
fire religion veils
Religion blushing, veils her sacred fires, And unawares Morality expires.
wise bears merit
Fear not the anger of the wise to raise; Those best can bear reproof who merit praise.