Alexander Pope Quotes on Man (48 Quotes)


    In Men, we various Ruling Passions find;
    In Women, two almost divide the kind;
    Those, only fix'd, they first or last obey,
    The Love of Pleasure, and the Love of Sway.


    But where's the man who counsel can bestow, Still pleased to teach, and yet not proud to know.

    Vast chain of being, which from God began,
    Natures ethereal, human, angel, man,
    Beast, bird, fish, insect!

    Yet not to earth's contracted span
    Thy goodness let me bound,
    Or think thee Lord alone of man,
    When thousand worlds are round.


    Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
    Man never Is, but always To be blest:
    The soul, uneasy and confin'd from home,
    Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

    Men, some to business, some to pleasure take But every woman is at heart a rake Men, some to quiet, some to public strife But every lady would be queen for life.

    Man never thinks himself happy, but when he enjoys those things which others want or desire.


    Of Manners gentle, of Affections mild; In Wit a man; Simplicity, a child.


    Awake my St John Leave all meaner things To low ambition, and the pride of kings. Let us, since life can little more supply Than just to look about us and to die, Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man A mighty maze but not without a.

    Extremes in nature equal ends produce; In man they join to some mysterious use.


    Some old men, continually praise the time of their youth. In fact, you would almost think that there were no fools in their days, but unluckily they themselves are left as an example.

    Pride is still aiming at the best houses: Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell; aspiring to be angels men rebel.


    Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell,
    Aspiring to be angels, men rebel:
    And who but wishes to invert the laws
    Of order, sins against th' Eternal Cause.


    Respecting man, whatever wrong we call,
    May, must be right, as relative to all.

    Ah ne'er so dire a Thirst of Glory boast,
    Nor in the Critick let the Man be lost!

    Let us, since life can little more supply Than just to look about us and to die, Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man A mighty maze but not without a plan.

    From Peer or Bishop 'tis no easy thing
    To draw the man who loves his God, or King:
    Alas!

    No, make me mistress to the man I love If there be yet another name more free More fond than mistress, make me that to thee.

    If, presume not to God to scan; The proper study of Mankind is Man. Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state, A being darkly wise, and rudely great.

    Why has not man a microscopic eye For this plain reason,man is not a fly.

    Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow The rest is all but leather or prunello.

    Once like thyself, I trembled, wept, and pray'd,
    Love's victim then, though now a sainted maid:
    But all is calm in this eternal sleep;
    Here grief forgets to groan, and love to weep,
    Ev'n superstition loses ev'ry fear:
    For God, not man, absolves our frailties here.

    No woman ever hates a man for being in love with her, but many a woman hate a man for being a friend to her.

    Some judge of Authors' Names, not Works, and then
    Nor praise nor blame the Writings, but the Men.

    Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed was the ninth beatitude.

    Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes,
    Men would be angels, angels would be gods.

    Happy the man, whose wish and care
    A few paternal acres bound,
    Content to breathe his native air,
    In his own ground.


    Back through the paths of pleasing sense I ran,
    Nor wish'd an Angel whom I lov'd a Man.

    Men must be taught as if you taught them not, and things unknown proposed as things forgot.

    A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.


    If the great end be human happiness,
    Then Nature deviates; and can man do less?



    Laugh where we must, be candid where we can But vindicate the ways of God to man.

    Each beast, each insect, happy in its own:
    Is Heav'n unkind to man, and man alone?

    The gen'ral order, since the whole began,
    Is kept in nature, and is kept in man.

    Fondly we think we honor merit then, When we but praise ourselves in other men.

    Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man.

    Not always actions show the man; we find who does a kindness is not therefore kind.



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