132 Alexander Pope Quotes

Alexander Pope quotes

1. An Essay on Criticism (1711)

2. The Iliad of Homer (1715 to 1720)

3. The Odyssey of Homer (1725)

4. The Dunciad (1728 to 1743)

5. Moral Essays (1731 to 1735)

6. An Essay on Man (1733 to 1734)

7. Imitations of Horace (1733 to 1738)

8. Happy the man whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air In his own ground.

9. Thus let me live, unseen, unknown; Thus unlamented let me die; Steal from the world, and not a stone Tell where I lie.

10. They dream in Courtship, but in Wedlock wake.

11. The mouse that always trusts to one poor hole Can never be a mouse of any soul.

12. Love seldom haunts the breast where learning lies, And Venus sets ere Mercury can rise.

13. Histories are more full of Examples of the Fidelity of dogs than of Friends.

14. I am his Highness' dog at Kew; Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

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

16. The flying Rumours gather'd as they roll'd, Scarce any Tale was sooner heard than told; And all who told it, added something new, And all who heard it, made Enlargements too, In ev'ry Ear it spread, on ev'ry Tongue it grew.

17. Nor Fame I slight, nor her favors call; She comes unlooked for, if she comes at all.

18. Unblemish'd let me live, or die unknown; O grant an honest fame, or grant me none!

19. How vast a memory has Love!

20. I find myself just in the same situation of mind you describe as your own, heartily wishing the good, that is the quiet of my country, and hoping a total end of all the unhappy divisions of mankind by party-spirit, which at best is but the madness of many for the gain of a few.

21. Dear, damned, distracting town, farewell! Thy fools no more I'll tease: This year in peace, ye critics, dwell, Ye harlots, sleep at ease!

22. Luxurious lobster-nights, farewell, For sober, studious days!

23. Who ne'er knew joy but friendship might divide, Or gave his father grief but when he died.

24. Such were the notes thy once lov'd poet sung, Till death untimely stopp'd his tuneful tongue.

25. Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear.

26. 'Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed' was the ninth beatitude which a man of wit (who, like a man of wit, was a long time in gaol) added to the eighth.

27. Let me tell you I am better acquainted with you for a long Absence, as men are with themselves for a long affliction: Absence does but hold off a friend, to make one see him the truer.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

28. The saint sustain'd it, but the woman died.

29. Good God! how often are we to die before we go quite off this stage? in every friend we lose a part of ourselves, and the best part.

30. Of Manners gentle, of Affections mild; In Wit, a Man; Simplicity, a Child.

31. For he lives twice who can at once employ The present well, and e'en the past enjoy.

32. There, take (says Justice), take ye each a shell: We thrive at Westminster on fools like you; 'T was a fat oyster,-live in peace,-adieu.

33. Who dared to love their country, and be poor.

34. Vain was the chief's, the sage's pride! They had no poet, and they died. In vain they schem'd, in vain they bled! They had no poet, and are dead.

35. Ye Gods! annihilate but space and time, And make two lovers happy.

36. Where'er you walk, cool gales shall fan the glade, Trees, where you sit, shall crowd into a shade: Where'er you tread, the blushing flow'rs shall rise, And all things flourish where you turn your eyes.

37. Say, is not absence death to those who love?

38. Let opening roses knotted oaks adorn, And liquid amber drop from every thorn.

39. The garlands fade, the vows are worn away; So dies her love, and so my hopes decay.

40. Vital spark of heav'nly flame! Quit, oh quit, this mortal frame: Trembling, hoping, ling'ring, flying, Oh the pain, the bliss of dying!

41. Hark! they whisper; angels say, Sister spirit, come away!

42. Tell me, my soul, can this be death?

43. Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly! O grave! where is thy victory? O death! where is thy sting?

44. 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.

45. Not chaos-like together crush'd and bruis'd, But as the world, harmoniously confus'd, Where order in variety we see, And where, though all things differ, all agree.

46. A mighty hunter, and his prey was man.

47. Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath, The clam'rous lapwings feel the leaden death; Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare, They fall, and leave their little lives in air.

48. From old Belerium to the northern main.

49. To wake the soul by tender strokes of art, To raise the genius, and to mend the heart; To make mankind, in conscious virtue bold, Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold: For this the Tragic Muse first trod the stage.

50. A brave man struggling in the storms of fate, And greatly falling with a falling state. While Cato gives his little senate laws, What bosom beats not in his country's cause?

51. Ignobly vain, and impotently great.

52. What dire offense from amorous causes springs, What mighty contests rise from trivial things!

53. And all Arabia breathes from yonder box.

54. On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.

55. If to her share some female errors fall, Look on her face, and you'll forget 'em all.

56. Fair tresses man's imperial race ensnare, And beauty draws us with a single hair.

57. Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey, Dost sometimes counsel take - and sometimes tea.

58. At every word a reputation dies.

59. The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, And wretches hang that jurymen may dine.

60. Let spades be trumps! she said, and trumps they were.

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

62. But when mischief mortals bend their will, How soon they find fit instruments of ill!

63. The meeting points the sacred hair dissever From the fair head, forever, and forever! Then flashed the living lightning from her eyes, And screams of horror rend th' affrighted skies.

64. Sir Plume, of amber snuff-box justly vain, And the nice conduct of a clouded cane.

65. Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.

66. Oh name forever sad! forever dear! Still breathed in sighs, still ushered with a tear.

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

68. Heaven first taught letters for some wretch's aid, Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid.

69. Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul, And waft a sigh from Indus to the Pole.

70. And truths divine came mended from that tongue.

71. How oft, when press'd to marriage, have I said, Curse on all laws but those which love has made! Love, free as air at sight of human ties, Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.

72. Let wealth, let honour, wait the wedded dame, August her deed, and sacred be her fame; Before true passion all those views remove, Fame, wealth, and honour! what are you to Love?

73. Curse on all laws but those which love has made! Love, free as air at sight of human ties, Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.

74. No, make me mistress to the man I love; If there be yet another name more free, More fond than mistress, make me that to thee!

75. And if I lose thy love, I lose my all.

76. And love the offender, yet detest the offence.

77. How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd...

78. One thought of thee puts all the pomp to flight, Priests, tapers, temples, swim before my sight.

79. See my lips tremble and my eyeballs roll, Suck my last breath, and catch my flying soul.

80. Condemn'd whole years in absence to deplore, And image charms he must behold no more, Such if there be, who loves so long, so well; Let him our sad, our tender story tell; The well-sung woes will sooth my pensive ghost; He best can paint them, who shall feel them most.

81. He best can paint them who shall feel them most.

82. What beck'ning ghost, along the moonlight shade Invites my steps, and points to yonder glade?

83. Is it, in Heav'n, a crime to love too well? To bear too tender, or too firm a heart, To act a lover's or a Roman's part? Is there no bright reversion in the sky, For those who greatly think, or bravely die?

84. Ambition first sprung from your blest abodes; The glorious fault of Angels and of Gods.

85. So perish all, whose breast ne'er learn'd to glow For others' good, or melt at others' woe.

86. By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed, By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed, By foreign hands thy humble grave adorned, By strangers honored, and by strangers mourned!

87. And bear about the mockery of woe To midnight dances and the public show.

88. How loved, how honored once, avails thee not, To whom related, or by whom begot; A heap of dust alone remains of thee; 'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be!

89. What we call a Genius, is hard to be distinguish'd by a man himself, from a strong inclination: and if his genius be ever so great, he can not at first discover it any other way, than by giving way to that prevalent propensity which renders him the more liable to be mistaken.

90. Therefore they who say our thoughts are not our own because they resemble the Ancients, may as well say our faces are not our own, because they are like our Fathers: And indeed it is very unreasonable, that people should expect us to be Scholars, and yet be angry to find us so.

91. I would not be like those Authors, who forgive themselves some particular lines for the sake of a whole Poem, and vice versa a whole Poem for the sake of some particular lines. I believe no one qualification is so likely to make a good writer, as the power of rejecting his own thoughts.

92. I never knew any man in my life who could not bear another's misfortunes perfectly like a Christian.

93. A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.

94. It is with narrow-souled people as with narrow necked bottles: the less they have in them, the more noise they make in pouring it out.

95. When men grow virtuous in their old age, they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil's leavings.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

96. Party is the madness of many, for the gain of a few.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

97. For, as blushing will sometimes make a whore pass for a virtuous woman, so modesty may make a fool seem a man of sense.

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

99. He who tells a lie, is not sensible how great a task he undertakes; for he must be forced to invent twenty more to maintain that one.

100. Our passions are like convulsion-fits, which, though they make us stronger for the time, leave us the weaker ever after.

101. Some old men, by continually praising the time of their youth, would almost persuade us that there were no fools in those days; but unluckily they are left themselves for examples.

102. Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.

103. The most positive men are the most credulous:

104. To be angry, is to revenge the fault of others upon ourselves.

105. Father of all! in every age, In every clime adored, By saint, by savage, and by sage, Jehovah, Jove, or Lord!

106. Thou Great First Cause, least understood Who all my sense confined To know but this, that Thou art good And that myself am blind.

107. And binding Nature fast in fate, Left free the human will.

108. Let not this weak, unknowing hand Presume Thy bolts to throw, And deal damnation round the land On each I judge Thy foe.

109. If I am right, Thy grace import Still in the right to stay; If I am wrong, oh teach my heart To find that better way!

110. Teach me to feel another's woe, To right the fault I see; That mercy I to others show, That mercy show to me.

111. Passions:are the gales of life:

112. True politeness consists in being easy one's self, and in making every one about one as easy as one can.

113. This is the Jew That Shakespeare drew.

     Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

114. A god without dominion, providence, and final causes, is nothing else but Fate and Nature.

115. A work of art that contains theories is like an object on which the price tag has been left.

116. Genius creates, and taste preserves. Taste is the good sense of genius; without taste, genius is only sublime folly.

117. You beat your pate, and fancy wit will come; Knock as you please, there's nobody at home.

118. Lull'd in the countless chambers of the brain, Our thoughts are link'd by many a hidden chain. Awake but one, and lo, what myriads rise! Each stamps its image as the other flies!

     Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

119. Never find fault with the absent.

120. The hidden harmony is better than the obvious.

     Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

121. The sick in body call for aid: the sick In mind are covetous of more disease; And when at worst, they dream themselves quite well. To know ourselves diseased, is half our cure.

122. What some call health, if purchased by perpetual anxiety about diet, isn't much better than tedious disease.

1. The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, and wretches hang that jury-men may dine

2. A mighty maze! But not without a plan.

3. Let such teach others who themselves excel, And censure freely who have written well.

4. For I, who hold sage Homer's rule the best, Welcome the coming, speed the going guest.

5. Like following life through creatures you dissect, You lose it in the moment you detect.

6. When two people compliment each other with the choice of anything, each of them generally gets that which he likes least.

7. Such labour'd nothings, in so strange a style, Amaze th' unlearn'd and make the learned smile.

8. She went from opera, park, assembly, play, To morning walks, and prayers three hours a day. To part her time 'twixt reading and bohea, To muse, and spill her solitary tea, Or o'er cold coffee trifle with the spoon, Count the slow clock, and dine exact at noon.

9. I am satisfied to trifle away my time, rather than let it stick by me.

10. The greatest advantage I know of being thought a wit by the world is, that it gives one the greater freedom of playing the fool.