Tis very certain the desire of life prolongs it.

Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes, Soft as her clime, and sunny as her skies

There is pleasure in the pathless woods

Yet Time, who changes all, had altered him in soul and aspect as in age: Years steal Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb; And Life’s enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim

Where the virgins are soft as the roses they twine, / And all, save the spirit of man, is divine.

Like music on the waters is they sweet voice to me.

The power of Thought, the magic of the Mind!

Proud of his learning (just enough to quote), He revell’d in his Ciceronian glory: With memory excellent to get by rote, With wit to hatch a pun or tell a story, Graced with some merit,...

Dead scandals form good subjects for dissection

Out of chaos God made a world, and out of high passions comes a people.

In short, he was a perfect cavalier, / And to his very valet seemed a hero.

What a strange thing man is; and what a stranger thing woman.

That all-softening, overpowering knell, / The tocsin of the soul – the dinner-bell.

Between two worlds life hovers like a star, twixt night and morn, upon the horizon’s verge.

Alas! The love of women! it is known to be a lovely and fearful thing!

Every sense hath been o’erstrung, and each frail fibre of the brain sent forth her thoughts all wild and wide

My hair is grey, but not with years, / Nor grew it white / In a single night, / As men’s have grown from sudden fears.

Imagination droops her pinion.

‘Tis pleasant, sure, to see one’s name in print. A book’s a book, although there’s nothing in ‘t.

Think’st thou existence doth depend on time? It doth; but actions are our epochs

I am never long, even in the society of her I love, without yearning for the company of my lamp and my library

But oh ye lords of ladies intellectual, Inform us truly – have they not henpecked you all

Man being reasonable must get drunk; The best of life is but intoxication; Glory, the grape, love, gold – in these are sunk – The hopes of all men and of every nation

Troy owes to Homer what whist owes to Hoyle

One of the pleasures of reading old letters is the knowledge that they need no answer

The English winter – ending in July, / To recommence in August.

Agree to a short armistice with truth.

And wrinkles (the damned democrats) won’t flatter

It is not one man nor a million, but the spirit of liberty that must be preserved. The waves which dash upon the shore are, one by one, broken, but the ocean conquers nevertheless. It...

She for him had given / Her all on earth, and more than all in heaven!

Folly loves the martyrdom of fame.

And yet a little tumult, now and then, is an agreeable quickener of sensation; such as a revolution, a battle, or an adventure of any lively description.

Adieu, adieu! my native shore / Fades o’er the waters blue.

I like a woman to talk or I am left with the suspicion that she is thinking.

Tis melancholy, and a fearful sign Of human frailty, folly, also crime, That love and marriage rarely can combine, Although they both are born in the same clime; Marriage from love, like vinegar from wine...

That low vice, curiosity!

And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ‘Tis that I may not weep

I am the very slave of circumstance / And impulse – borne away with every breath!

Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven!

Liberty – eternal spirit of the chainless mind

If I could always read, I should never feel the want of company.

There is no sterner moralist than pleasure.

The Christian has greatly the advantage of the unbeliever, having everything to gain and nothing to lose

He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose.

He pattered with his keys at a great rate, / And sweated through his apostolic skin: / Of course his perspiration was but ichor, / Or some such other spiritual liquor.

I stood among them, but not of them; in a shroud of thoughts which were not their thoughts.

One hates an author that’s all author

It is not for minds like ours to give or to receive flatter; yet the praises of sincerity have ever been permitted to the voice of friendship

In general I do not draw well with literary men / not that I dislike them but I never know what to say to them after I have praised their last publication.

While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; / When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall; / And when Rome falls – the World.