William Davenant
William Davenant
Sir William Davenant, also spelled D'Avenant, was an English poet and playwright. Along with Thomas Killigrew, Davenant was one of the rare figures in English Renaissance theatre whose career spanned both the Caroline and Restoration eras and who was active both before and after the English Civil War and during the Interregnum...
feet liberty heroic
How much pleasure they lose (and even the pleasures of heroic poesy are not unprofitable) who take away the liberty of a poet, and fetter his feet in the shackles of a historian.
hate abuse sin
It is the wit and policy of sin to hate those we have abused.
sorrow spy safe
Since knowledge is but sorrow's spy, It is not safe to know.
summer wise stars
To a Mistress Dying Lover. YOUR beauty, ripe and calm and fresh As eastern summers are, Must now, forsaking time and flesh, Add light to some small star. Philosopher. Whilst she yet lives, were stars decay'd, Their light by hers relief might find; But Death will lead her to a shade Where Love is cold and Beauty blind. Lover. Lovers, whose priests all poets are, Think every mistress, when she dies, Is changed at least into a star: And who dares doubt the poet wise? Philosopher. But ask not bodies doom'd to die To what abode they go; Since Knowledge is but Sorrow's spy, It is not safe to know.
glasses perfect calamity
Calamity is the perfect glass wherein we truly see and know ourselves.
nice men jewels
Go! dive into the Southern Sea, and when Th'ast found, to trouble the nice sight of men, A swelling pearl, and such whose single worth Boasts all the wonders which the seas bring forth, Give it Endymion's love, whose ev'ry tear Would more enrich the skilful jeweller.
stars eye light
Aubade THE lark now leaves his wat'ry nest, And climbing shakes his dewy wings. He takes this window for the East, And to implore your light he sings- Awake, awake! the morn will never rise Till she can dress her beauty at your eyes. The merchant bows unto the seaman's star, The ploughman from the sun his season takes, But still the lover wonders what they are Who look for day before his mistress wakes. Awake, awake! break thro' your veils of lawn! Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawn!
wise men soul
The assembled souls of all that men held wise.
wise prayer ocean
Praise and Prayer PRAISE is devotion fit for mighty minds, The diff'ring world's agreeing sacrifice; Where Heaven divided faiths united finds: But Prayer in various discord upward flies. For Prayer the ocean is where diversely Men steer their course, each to a sev'ral coast; Where all our interests so discordant be That half beg winds by which the rest are lost. By Penitence when we ourselves forsake, 'Tis but in wise design on piteous Heaven; In Praise we nobly give what God may take, And are, without a beggar's blush, forgiven.
gratitude birth
All jealousy must be strangled in its birth...
ability
What one cannot, another can.
anger blood wrath
Anger is blood, poured and perplexed into froth; but malice is the wisdom of our wrath.
army honor moral
Honor is the moral conscience of the great.
law innocence knows
Had laws not been, we never had been blam'd; For not to know we sinn'd is innocence.