Literary Critics

"His pensive cheek upon his hand reclined, And anxious thoughts revolving in his mind."

"Then thus a senior of the place replies, Well read, and curious of antiquities."

"Some on antiquated authors pore; Rummage for sense."

"Perpetual anguish fills his anxious breast, Not stopt by business, nor composed by rest; No music cheers him, nor no feast can please."

"Casting nets were spread in shallow brooks, Drags in the deep, and baits were hung on hooks."

"He, like a patient angler, ere he strook, Would let them play awhile upon the hook."

"If on your head my fury does not turn, Thank that fond dotage which so much you scorn."

"I beg the grace You would lay by those terrors of your face; Till calmness to your eyes you first restore, I am afraid, and I can beg no more."

"When he knew his rival freed and gone, He swells with wrath; he makes outrageous moan: He frets, he fumes, he stares, he stamps the ground, The hollow tow’r with clamours rings around."

"I saw th’ angelic guards from earth ascend, Grieved they must now no longer man attend; The beams about their temples dimly shone; One would have thought the crime had been their own."

"That we may angels seem, we paint them elves, And are but satires to set up ourselves."

"When we behold an angel, not to fear, Is to be impudent."

"Obscure! why prythee what am I? I know My father, grandsire, and great grandsire too: If farther I derive my pedigree, I can but guess beyond the fourth degree. The rest of my forgotten ancestors Were sons of earth."

"From a mean stock the pious Decii came; Yet such their virtues, that their loss alone For Rome and all our regions did atone."

"Auspicious chief! thy race, in times to come, Shall spread the conquests of imperial Rome."

"So bright a splendour, so divine a grace, The glorious Daphnis casts on his illustrious race."

"For if the sire be faint, or out of case, He will be copied in his famish’d race."

"Please thy pride, and search the herald’s roll, Where thou shalt find thy famous pedigree, Drawn from the root of some old Tuscan tree, And thou, a thousand off, a fool of long degree."

"What have I lost by my forefathers’ fault! Why was I not the twentieth by descent From a long restive race of droning kings?"

"Thus, born alike, from virtue first began The diffrence that distinguish’d man from man: He claim’d no title from descent of blood; But that which made him noble, made him good."

"Do then as your progenitors have done, And by their virtues prove yourself their son."

"Long galleries of ancestors Challenge nor wonder or esteem from me: "Virtue alone is true nobility.""

"Vain are their hopes who fancy to inherit, By trees of pedigree, or fame or merit; Though plodding heralds through each branch may trace Old captains and dictators of their race."

"Were virtue by descent, a noble name Could never villanize his father’s fame; But, as the first, the last of all the line Would, like the sun, ev’n in descending, shine."

"Dare to be great without a guilty crown; View it, and lay the bright temptation down: ’Tis base to seize on all."

"Leave to fathom such high points as these, Nor be ambitious, ere the time, to please; Unseasonably wise, till age and cares Have form’d thy soul to manage great affairs."

"To cure their mad ambition, they were sent To rule a distant province, each alone: What could a careful father more have done?"

"Why does Antony dream out his hours, And tempts not fortune for a noble day?"

"With joy th’ ambitious youth his mother heard, And, eager, for the journey soon prepared; He longs the world beneath him to survey, To guide the chariot, and to give the day."

"No toil, no hardship can restrain Ambitious man inured to pain; The more confined, the more he tries, And at forbidden quarry flies."

"O diadem, thou centre of ambition, Where all its different lines are reconciled; As if thou wert the burning glass of glory."

"Too truly Tamerlane’s successors they; Each thinks a world too little for his sway."

"One world sufficed not Alexander’s mind; Coop’d up he seem’d, in earth and seas confined."

"Those who to empire by dark paths aspire, Still plead a call to what they most desire."

"Some through ambition, or through thirst of gold, Have slain their brothers, and their country sold."

"If your care to wheat alone extend, Let Maia with her sisters first descend, Before you trust in earth your future hope, Or else expect a listless, lazy crop."

"Did we for these barbarians plant and sow, On these, on these our happy fields bestow?"

"While the reaper fills his greedy hands, And binds the golden sheaves in brittle bands."

"Here the marshy grounds approach your fields, And there the soil a stony harvest yields."

"The wiser madman did for virtue toil A thorny, or at least a barren, soil."

"Bid the laborious hind, Whose harden’d hands did long in tillage toil, Neglect the promised harvest of the soil."

"Let thy hand supply the pruning-knife, And crop luxuriant stragglers."

"Be mindful With iron teeth of rakes and prongs to move The crusted earth."

"Nor is the profit small the peasant makes, Who smooths with harrow, or who pounds with rakes, The crumbling clods."

"Root up wild olives from thy labour’d lands."

"Ah that your business had been mine, To pen the sheep."

"At harvest-home, and on the shearing day, When he should thanks to Pan and Pales pay."

"In vain the barns expect their promised load; Nor barns at home, nor ricks are heap’d abroad."

"First, with assiduous care from winter keep, Well fother’d in the stalls, thy tender sheep; Then spread with straw the bedding of thy fold, With fern beneath, to fend the bitter cold."

"The soil, with fatt’ning moisture fill’d, Is clothed with grass, and fruitful to be till’d; Such as in fruitful vales we view from high, Which dripping rocks, not rowling streams supply."