John Dryden
John Dryden
John Drydenwas an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made England's first Poet Laureate in 1668...
blind zeal conductor
Zeal, the blind conductor of the will.
unseen degrees habit
All habits gather by unseen degrees.
men light heaven
Virtue without success is a fair picture shown by an ill light; but lucky men are favorites of heaven; all own the chief, when fortune owns the cause.
men world neighbor
It's a hard world, neighbors, if a man's oath must be his master.
loss vices sin
Fattened in vice, so callous and so gross, he sins and sees not, senseless of his loss.
may oblivion crime
Among our crimes oblivion may be set.
soul able too-much
Some of our philosophizing divines have too much exalted the faculties of our souls, when they have maintained that by their force mankind has been able to find out God.
happiness long
They live too long who happiness outlive.
may poet elegant
Virgil, above all poets, had a stock which I may call almost inexhaustible, of figurative, elegant, and sounding words.
mean hands pimp
But when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.
friends no-friends wretched
The wretched have no friends.
race murmuring headstrong
The Jews, a headstrong, moody, murmuring race.
heart mind desert
The gods, (if gods to goodness are inclined If acts of mercy touch their heavenly mind), And, more than all the gods, your generous heart, Conscious of worth, requite its own desert!
fate wool clue
The Fates but only spin the coarser clue; The finest of the wool is left for you.