"Nay, tho' our Atoms shou'd revolve by chance, And matter leape into the former dance; Tho' time our Life and motion cou'd restore, And make our Bodies what they were before, What gain to us wou'd all this bustle bring, The new made man wou'd be another thing; When once an interrupting pause is made, That individual Being is decay'd. We, who are dead and gone, shall bear no part In all the pleasures, nor shall feel the smart, Which to that other Mortal shall accrew, Whom of our Matter Time shall mould anew."

"Milton's Paradise Lost is admirable; but am I therefore bound to maintain, that there are no flats amongst his elevations, when it is evident he creeps along sometimes for above an hundred lines together? Cannot I admire the height of his invention, and the strength of his expression, without defending his antiquated words, and the perpetual harshness of their sound? It is as much commendation as a man can bear, to own him excellent; all beyond it is idolatry."

"I can enjoy her while she's kind; But when she dances in the wind, And shakes the wings and will not stay, I puff the prostitute away: The little or the much she gave is quietly resign'd: Content with poverty, my soul I arm; And virtue, though in rags, will keep me warm."

"Be fair, or foul, or rain, or shine, The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine. Not heaven itself upon the past has power; But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour."

"Happy the man, and happy he alone, He who can call today his own; He who, secure within, can say, Tomorrow, do thy worst, for I have lived today."

"More Safe, and much more modest 'tis, to say God wou'd not leave Mankind without a way: And that the Scriptures, though not every where Free from Corruption, or intire, or clear, Are uncorrupt, sufficient, clear, intire, In all things which our needfull Faith require. If others in the same Glass better see 'Tis for Themselves they look, but not for me: For my Salvation must its Doom receive Not from what others, but what I believe."

"Dim as the borrowed beams of moon and stars To lonely, weary, wandering travellers Is reason to the soul; and as on high Those rolling fires discover but the sky Not light us here, so reason's glimmering ray Was lent, not to assure our doubtful way, But guide us upward to a better day: And as those nightly tapers disappear When day's bright lord ascends our hemisphere, So pale grows reason at religion's sight, So dies, and so dissolves in supernatural light."

"A man is to be cheated into passion, but to be reasoned into truth."

"Leave writing plays, and choose for thy command Some peaceful province in acrostic land. There thou mayst wings display and altars raise, And torture one poor word ten thousand ways."

"The rest to some faint meaning make pretense, But Shadwell never deviates into sense. Some beams of wit on other souls may fall, Strike through and make a lucid interval; But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray, His rising fogs prevail upon the day."

"All human things are subject to decay, And, when fate summons, monarchs must obey."

"Made still a blund'ring kind of melody; Spurred boldly on, and dashed through thick and thin, Through sense and nonsense, never out nor in. Free from all meaning, whether good or bad, And in one word, heroically mad."

"Beware the fury of a patient man."

"Never was patriot yet, but was a fool."

"Nor is the people's judgment always true: The most may err as grossly as the few."

"Thus in a pageant-show a plot is made; And peace itself is war in masquerade."

"His tribe were God Almighty's gentlemen."

"Every man with him was God or devil."

"A man so various, that he seem’d to be Not one, but all mankind’s epitome; Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong, Was everything by starts, and nothing long; But in the course of one revolving moon Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon."

"But far more numerous was the herd of such, Who think too little, and who talk too much."

"Not only hating David, but the king."

"Self-defence is nature's eldest law"

"Better one suffer, than a nation grieve."

"All empire is no more than power in trust."

"The people's prayer, the glad diviner's theme, The young men's vision, and the old men's dream!"

"And heaven had wanted one immortal song. But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand, And fortune's ice prefers to virtue's land."

"In friendship false, implacable in hate, Resolved to ruin, or to rule the state."

"And all to leave, what with his toil he won To that unfeathered two-legged thing, a son."

"Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide."

"Plots, true or false, are necessary things, To raise up commonwealths and ruin kings."

"Whate’er he did, was done with so much ease, In him alone 'twas natural to please."

"Nor can his blessed soul look down from heaven, Or break the eternal sabbath of his rest."

"As sure as a gun."

"They say everything in the world is good for something."

"He's a sure card."

"Second thoughts, they say, are best."

"Like a led victim, to my death I'll go, And, dying, bless the hand that gave the blow."

"Lord of humankind."

"There is a pleasure sure In being mad which none but madmen know."

"It is almost impossible to translate verbally and well at the same time; for the Latin (a most severe and compendious language) often expresses that in one word which either the barbarity or the narrowness of modern tongues cannot supply in more. ... But since every language is so full of its own proprieties that what is beautiful in one is often barbarous, nay, sometimes nonsense, in another, it would be unreasonable to limit a translator to the narrow compass of his author's words; it is enough if he choose out some expression which does not vitiate the sense."

"She, though in full-blown flower of glorious beauty, Grows cold even in the summer of her age."

"Of no distemper, of no blast he died, But fell like autumn fruit that mellowed long — Even wondered at, because he dropped no sooner. Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore years, Yet freshly ran he on ten winters more; Till like a clock worn out with eating time, The wheels of weary life at last stood still."

"His hair just grizzled, As in a green old age."

"Whatever is, is in its causes just."

"With how much ease believe we what we wish!"

"Men are but children of a larger growth; Our appetites as apt to change as theirs, And full as craving, too, and full as vain."

"The wretched have no friends."

"Give, you gods, Give to your boy, your Caesar, The rattle of a globe to play withal, This gewgaw world, and put him cheaply off; I'll not be pleased with less than Cleopatra."

"Let those find fault whose wit's so very small, They've need to show that they can think at all; Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow; He who would search for pearls, must dive below. Fops may have leave to level all they can; As pigmies would be glad to lop a man. Half-wits are fleas; so little and so light, We scarce could know they live, but that they bite."

"A brave man scorns to quarrel once a day; Like Hectors in at every petty fray."