John Dryden
John Dryden
John Drydenwas an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made England's first Poet Laureate in 1668...
winter land wings
Fowls, by winter forced, forsake the floods, and wing their hasty flight to happier lands.
war delay dangerous
All delays are dangerous in war.
sweet war fighting
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures, Soon he sooth'd his soul to pleasures. War, he sung, is toil and trouble; Honour but an empty bubble; Never ending, still beginning, Fighting still, and still destroying. If all the world be worth the winning, Think, oh think it worth enjoying: Lovely Thais sits beside thee, Take the good the gods provide thee.
eye soul spiders
Our souls sit close and silently within, And their own web from their own entrails spin; And when eyes meet far off, our sense is such, That, spider-like, we feel the tenderest touch.
success achieve greater
The greater part performed achieves the less.
beauty constitution harmony
Beauty is nothing else but a just accord and mutual harmony of the members, animated by a healthful constitution.
running giving judgment
What judgment I had increases rather than diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or reject; to run them into verse or to give them the other harmony of prose.
law lasts firsts
The first is the law, the last prerogative.
victory undone
Even victors are by victories undone.
responsibility thinking democracy
Democracy is essentially anti-authoritarian--that is, it not only demands the right but imposes the responsibility of thinking for ourselves.
beauty hands masters
To draw true beauty shows a master's hand.
men levels needs
For danger levels man and brute And all are fellows in their need.
ocean science moon
Then we upon our globe's last verge shall go, And view the ocean leaning on the sky: From thence our rolling Neighbours we shall know, And on the Lunar world securely pry.
fear fate son
When the Sun sets, shadows, that shew'd at Noon But small, appear most long and terrible; So, when we think Fate hovers o'er our Heads, Our apprehensions shoot beyond all bounds, Owls, Ravens, Crickets seem the watch of death, Nature's worst Vermine scare her God-like Sons. Ecchoes the very leavings of a Voice, Grow babling Ghosts, and call us to our Graves: Each Mole-hill thought swells to a huge Olympus, While we fantastick Dreamers heave and puff, And sweat with an Imagination's weight...