Alexander Pope Quotes (535 Quotes)

Authors, like coins, grow dear as they grow old It is the rust we value, not the gold.

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

For fools admire, but men of sense approve.

Oh, Madness, Pride, Impiety!

A person who is too nice an observer of the business of the crowd, like one who is too curious in observing the labor of bees, will often be stung for his curiosity.

Here hills and vales, the woodland and the plain Here earth and water seem to strive again, Not chaos-like together crushed and bruised, But, as the world, harmoniously confused Where order in variety we see, And where, though all things differ, all agree.

But what are these to great Atossa's mind?

Canst thou forget that sad, that solemn day,
When victims at yon altar's foot we lay?

Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate.

Of man what see we, but his station here,
From which to reason, or to which refer?

Here am I, dying of a hundred good symptoms.

In Praise so just, let ev'ry Voice be join'd,
And fill the Gen'ral Chorus of Mankind!

Here files of pins extend their shining rows, Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, billet-doux.

Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.

Say, what can cause such impotence of mind?

Coffee, which makes the politician wise, And see through all things with his half-shut eyes.

Heav'n, as its purest gold, by tortures tried; The saint sustained it, but the woman died.

Nature and nature's laws lay hid in the night. God said, Let Newton be! and all was light!

Now warm in love, now with'ring in my bloom Lost in a convent's solitary gloom.

What dire offence from amorous causes springs, What mighty contests rise from trivial things, I sing.

Why pique all mortals, yet affect a name?

The young disease, that must subdue at length, Grows with his growth, and strengthens with his strength.

Blest with a Taste exact, yet unconfin'd;
A Knowledge both of Books and Humankind;
Gen'rous Converse; a Sound exempt from Pride;
And Love to Praise, with Reason on his Side?

False happiness is like false money it passes for a time as well as the true, and serves some ordinary occasions but when it is brought to the touch, we find the lightness and alloy, and feel the loss.

He knows to live who keeps the middle state.

Yet write, oh write me all, that I may join
Griefs to thy griefs, and echo sighs to thine.

But thousands die without or this or that, Die, and endow a college, or a cat; To some, indeed, Heaven grants the happier fate, T'enrich a bastard, or a son they hate.

The scripture in times of disputes is like an open town in times of war, which serves in differently the occasions of both parties.

Such labour'd Nothings, in so strange a Style,
Amaze th'unlearn'd, and make the Learned Smile.

Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise.

In wit a man simplicity a child.

Some daemon stole my pen (forgive th' offence)And once betrayed me into common sense. Else all my prose and verse were much the same.

Where'er you find the cooling western breeze', In the next line, it whispers through the trees'If crystal streams with pleasing murmurs creep', The reader's threatened, not in vain, with sleep'.

He's armed without that's innocent within.

She speaks, behaves, and acts just as she ought;
But never, never, reach'd one gen'rous Thought.