Don Juan (Byron)

"And Coleridge, too, has lately taken wing, But like a hawk encumber'd with his hood,— Explaining metaphysics to the nation— I wish he would explain his explanation."

"And Wordsworth, in a rather long Excursion (I think the quarto holds five hundred pages), Has given a sample from the vasty version Of his new system to perplex the sages; 'Tis poetry—at least by his assertion, And may appear so when the dog-star rages— And he who understands it would be able To add a story to the Tower of Babel."

"You're shabby fellows—true—but poets still, And duly seated on the immortal hill."

"Your bays may hide the baldness of your brows— Perhaps some virtuous blushes."

"Scott, Rogers, Campbell, Moore, and Crabbe will try 'Gainst you the question with posterity."

"For me, who, wandering with pedestrian Muses, Contend not with you on the winged steed, I wish your fate may yield ye, when she chooses, The fame you envy and the skill you need."

"If, fallen in evil days on evil tongues, Milton appeal'd to the Avenger, Time, If Time, the Avenger, execrates his wrongs, And makes the word 'Miltonic' mean sublime,' He deign'd not to belie his soul in songs Nor turn his very talent to a crime; He did not loathe the Sire to laud the Son, But closed the tyrant-hater he begun."

"Would he adore a sultan? he obey The intellectual eunuch Castlereagh?"

"I want a hero: an uncommon want, When every year and month sends forth a new one, Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant, The age discovers he is not the true one; Of such as these I should not care to vaunt, I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan— We all have seen him, in the pantomime, Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time."

"Brave men were living before Agamemnon."

"Most epic poets plunge "in medias res" (Horace makes this the heroic turnpike road)."

"My way is to begin with the beginning."

"In Seville was he born, a pleasant city, Famous for oranges and women."

"His father's name was Jóse—Don, of course,— A true Hidalgo, free from every stain Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain."

"Her favourite science was the mathematical, Her noblest virtue was her magnanimity, Her wit (she sometimes tried at wit) was Attic all, Her serious sayings darken'd to sublimity; In short, in all things she was fairly what I call A prodigy."

"She knew the Latin—that is, "the Lord's prayer," And Greek—the alphabet—I'm nearly sure."

"'Tis strange—the Hebrew noun which means 'I am,' The English always used to govern d--n."

"In virtues nothing earthly could surpass her, Save thine "incomparable oil," Macassar!"

"Perfect she was, but as perfection is Insipid in this naughty world of ours, Where our first parents never learn'd to kiss Till they were exiled from their earlier bowers, Where all was peace, and innocence, and bliss (I wonder how they got through the twelve hours), Don Jóse, like a lineal son of Eve, Went plucking various fruit without her leave."

"Now Donna Inez had, with all her merit, A great opinion of her own good qualities; Neglect, indeed, requires a saint to bear it, And such, indeed, she was in her moralities; But then she had a devil of a spirit, And sometimes mix'd up fancies with realities."

"Fans turn into falchions in fair hands."

"But — Oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual, Inform us truly, have they not hen-peck'd you all?"

"I loathe that low vice—curiosity."

"A little curly-headed, good-for-nothing, And mischief-making monkey from his birth."

"Don Jóse and the Donna Inez led For some time an unhappy sort of life, Wishing each other, not divorced, but dead."

"Dead scandals form good subjects for dissection."

"The languages, especially the dead, The sciences, and most of all the abstruse, The arts, at least all such as could be said To be the most remote from common use, In all these he was much and deeply read."

"But Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one Beginning with "Formosum Pastor Corydon.""

"The darkness of her Oriental eye Accorded with her Moorish origin (Her blood was not all Spanish, by the by; In Spain, you know, this is a sort of sin); When proud Granada fell, and, forced to fly, Boabdil wept, of Donna Julia's kin Some went to Africa, some stay'd in Spain, Her great-great-grandmamma chose to remain. She married (I forget the pedigree) With an Hidalgo, who transmitted down His blood less noble than such blood should be; At such alliances his sires would frown, In that point so precise in each degree That they bred in and in, as might be shown, Marrying their cousins—nay, their aunts, and nieces, Which always spoils the breed, if it increases. This heathenish cross restored the breed again, Ruin'd its blood, but much improved its flesh; For from a root the ugliest in Old Spain Sprung up a branch as beautiful as fresh; The sons no more were short, the daughters plain."

"She Was married, charming, chaste, and twenty-three."

"Her eye (I’m very fond of handsome eyes) Was large and dark, suppressing half its fire Until she spoke, then through its soft disguise Flash’d an expression more of pride than ire, And love than either; and there would arise A something in them which was not desire, But would have been, perhaps, but for the soul Which struggled through and chasten’d down the whole."

"Her glossy hair was cluster’d o’er a brow Bright with intelligence, and fair, and smooth; Her eyebrow’s shape was like th’ aerial bow, Her cheek all purple with the beam of youth, Mounting at times to a transparent glow, As if her veins ran lightning."

"She, in sooth, Possess'd an air and grace by no means common: Her stature tall — I hate a dumpy woman."

"That indecent sun, Who cannot leave alone our helpless clay, But will keep baking, broiling, burning on."

"The flesh is frail, and so the soul undone."

"What men call gallantry, and gods adultery, Is much more common where the climate's sultry."

"Yet he was jealous, though he did not show it, For jealousy dislikes the world to know it."

"A quiet conscience makes one so serene!"

"Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded That all the Apostles would have done as they did."

"He thought about himself, and the whole earth Of man the wonderful, and of the stars, And how the deuce they ever could have birth; And then he thought of earthquakes, and of wars, How many miles the moon might have in girth, Of air-balloons, and of the many bars To perfect knowledge of the boundless skies;— And then he thought of Donna Julia's eyes."

"'Twas strange that one so young should thus concern His brain about the action of the sky; If you think 'twas philosophy that this did, I can't help thinking puberty assisted."

"The sun set, and up rose the yellow moon: The devil's in the moon for mischief; they Who call'd her , methinks, began too soon Their nomenclature; there is not a day, The longest, not the twenty-first of June, Sees half the business in a wicked way On which three single hours of moonshine smile— And then she looks so modest all the while."

"But who, alas! can love, and then be wise? Not that remorse did not oppose temptation; A little still she strove, and much repented And whispering "I will ne'er consent"—consented."

"'Tis sweet to listen as the night-winds creep From leaf to leaf; 'tis sweet to view on high The rainbow, based on ocean, span the sky."

"'Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark Bay deep-mouth'd welcome as we draw near home; 'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark Our coming, and look brighter when we come; 'Tis sweet to be awaken'd by the lark, Or lull'd by falling waters; sweet the hum Of bees, the voice of girls, the song of birds, The lisp of children, and their earliest words."

"Sweet is the vintage, when the showering grapes In Bacchanal profusion reel to earth, Purple and gushing: sweet are our escapes From civic revelry to rural mirth; Sweet to the miser are his glittering heaps, Sweet to the father is his first-born's birth, Sweet is revenge—especially to women, Pillage to soldiers, prize-money to seamen."

"'Tis sweet to win, no matter how, one's laurels, By blood or ink; 'tis sweet to put an end To strife; 'tis sometimes sweet to have our quarrels, Particularly with a tiresome friend: Sweet is old wine in bottles, ale in barrels; Dear is the helpless creature we defend Against the world; and dear the schoolboy spot We ne'er forget, though there we are forgot."

"But sweeter still than this, than these, than all, Is first and passionate love—it stands alone, Like Adam's recollection of his fall; The tree of knowledge has been pluck'd—all's known— And life yields nothing further to recall Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown, No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven Fire which Prometheus filch'd for us from heaven."

"Pleasure's a sin, and sometimes sin's a pleasure."

"Bob Southey! You're a poet—Poet-laureate, And representative of all the race, Although 'tis true that you turn'd out a Tory at Last,—yours has lately been a common case; And now, my Epic Renegade! what are ye at? With all the Lakers, in and out of place? A nest of tuneful persons, to my eye Like "four and twenty Blackbirds in a pye.""