Alexander Pope famous quotes

To err is human; to forgive, divine.
-- Alexander Pope

#Inspirational #Forgiveness #Letting Go

Teach me to feel another's woe, to hide the fault I see, that mercy I to others show, that mercy show to me.
-- Alexander Pope

#Helping Others #Volunteer #Woe

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

#Inspirational #Education #Time

On life's vast ocean diversely we sail. Reasons the card, but passion the gale.
-- Alexander Pope

#Life #Ocean #Passion

Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wisdom #Fear #Angel

Many men have been capable of doing a wise thing, more a cunning thing, but very few a generous thing.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wise #Honesty #Women

Act well your part, there all the honour lies.
-- Alexander Pope

#Lying #Theatre #Deceit

A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.
-- Alexander Pope

#Education #Spring #Learning

Hope springs eternal in the human breast: Man never is, but always To be Blest.
-- Alexander Pope

#Hope #Spring #Men

An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie; for an excuse is a lie guarded.
-- Alexander Pope

#Motivation #Lying #Excuse

In faith and hope the world will disagree, but all mankind's concern is charity.
-- Alexander Pope

#World #Charity #Hope And Faith

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

#Art #Tag #Theory

Of all the causes which conspire to blind Man's erring judgement, and misguide the mind, What the weak head with strongest bias rules, Is PRIDE, the never-failing vice of fools.
-- Alexander Pope

#Failure #Pride #Men

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

#Lying #Twenties #Tasks

Aurora now, fair daughter of the dawn, Sprinkled with rosy light the dewy lawn.
-- Alexander Pope

#Daughter #Nature #Light

All nature is but art unknown to thee.
-- Alexander Pope

#Art #Nature #Literature

Love, free as air, at sight of human ties, Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.
-- Alexander Pope

#Life #Light #Sight

Praise undeserved, is satire in disguise.
-- Alexander Pope

#Literature #Praise #Satire

He best can paint them who shall feel them most.
-- Alexander Pope

#Painting #Paint #Feels

The sound must seem an echo to the sense.
-- Alexander Pope

#Echoes #Sound

All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.
-- Alexander Pope

#Life #God #Nature

Fools admire, but men of sense approve.
-- Alexander Pope

#Men #Stupidity #Criticism

But Satan now is wiser than of yore, and tempts by making rich, not making poor.
-- Alexander Pope

#Temptation #Literature #Satan

Trust not yourself, but your defects to know, make use of every friend and every foe.
-- Alexander Pope

#Friendship #Trust #Knowledge

The vanity of human life is like a river, constantly passing away, and yet constantly coming on.
-- Alexander Pope

#Rivers #Vanity #Life Is Like

I am his Highness' dog at Kew; Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?
-- Alexander Pope

#Dog #Praying #Highness

True disputants are like true sportsmen: their whole delight is in the pursuit.
-- Alexander Pope

#Athlete #Delight #Pursuit

Beauty draws us with a single hair.
-- Alexander Pope

#Hair #Draws

The vulgar boil, the learned roast, an egg.
-- Alexander Pope

#Eggs #Cooking #Vulgar

Be thou the first true merit to befriend, his praise is lost who stays till all commend.
-- Alexander Pope

#Merit #Firsts #Dignity

Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue
-- Alexander Pope

#Envy #Shade #Merit

O peace! how many wars were waged in thy name.
-- Alexander Pope

#War #Names

Envy will merit as its shade pursue, But like a shadow, proves the substance true.
-- Alexander Pope

#Envy #Shadow #Merit

Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend.
-- Alexander Pope

#Friendship #Philosopher #Guides

You purchase pain with all that joy can give and die of nothing but a rage to live.
-- Alexander Pope

#Pain #Giving #Joy

Words are like Leaves; and where they most abound, Much Fruit of Sense beneath is rarely found.
-- Alexander Pope

#Writing #Knowledge #Fruit

Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
-- Alexander Pope

#Life #Motivational #Positive

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

#Strength #Time #Passion

Of Manners gentle, of Affections mild; In Wit a man; Simplicity, a child.
-- Alexander Pope

#Children #Men #Simplicity

Is there a parson much bemused in beer, a maudlin poetess, a rhyming peer, a clerk foredoom'd his father's soul to cross, who pens a stanza when he should engross?
-- Alexander Pope

#Father #Beer #Soul

Not to go back is somewhat to advance, and men must walk, at least, before they dance.
-- Alexander Pope

#Dance #Wisdom #Time

Drink is the feast of reason and the flow of soul.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wine #Soul #Flow

A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink of it deeply, or taste it not, for shallow thoughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking deeply sobers us again.
-- Alexander Pope

#Education #Money #Drinking

Nothing can be more shocking and horrid than one of our kitchens sprinkled with blood, and abounding with the cries of expiring victims or with the limbs of dead animals scattered or hung up here and there.
-- Alexander Pope

#Animal #Blood #Kitchen

How vast a memory has Love!
-- Alexander Pope

#Life #Memories #Love Life

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 flowers shall rise, And all things flourish where you turn your eyes.
-- Alexander Pope

#Summer #Flower #Eye

As the twig is bent, so grows the tree.
-- Alexander Pope

#Tree #Twigs #Bent

True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, as those who move easiest have learned to dance.
-- Alexander Pope

#Dance #Art #Moving

The greatest magnifying glasses in the world are a man's own eyes when they look upon his own person.
-- Alexander Pope

#Eye #Men #Glasses

Strength of mind is exercise, not rest.
-- Alexander Pope

#Education #Exercise #Mind

Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.
-- Alexander Pope

#Loyalty #Dog #Silly

Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain, our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain; awake but one, and in, what myriads rise!
-- Alexander Pope

#Memories #Brain #Chains

A little learning is a dangerous thing.
-- Alexander Pope

#Education #Learning #Knowledge

No one should be ashamed to admit they are wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that they are wiser today than they were yesterday.
-- Alexander Pope

#Inspirational #Motivational #Inspiring

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

#God #Christian #Adversity

Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed was the ninth beatitude.
-- Alexander Pope

#Blessed #Men #Expect Nothing

To be angry is to revenge the faults of others on ourselves.
-- Alexander Pope

#Spiritual #Revenge #Hate

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

#Design #Sublime #Genius

And die of nothing but a rage to live.
-- Alexander Pope

#Death #Rage

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.
-- Alexander Pope

#Death #Dying #Good God

On wrongs swift vengeance waits.
-- Alexander Pope

#Waiting #Vengeance

Tis but a part we see, and not a whole.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wisdom

True wit is nature to advantage dressed, what oft was thought, but never so well expressed.
-- Alexander Pope

#Nature #Tongue #Advantage

The most positive men are the most credulous.
-- Alexander Pope

#Positive #Success #Attitude

Men must be taught as if you taught them not, and things unknown proposed as things forgot.
-- Alexander Pope

#Men #Taught

Then marble, soften'd into life, grew warm.
-- Alexander Pope

#Sculpture #Grew #Marble

Offend her, and she knows not to forgive; Oblige her, and she'll hate you while you live.
-- Alexander Pope

#Hate #Women #Forgiving

Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of fate, All but the page prescribed, their present state: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know: Or who could suffer being here below?
-- Alexander Pope

#Book #Fate #Men

Poets heap virtues, painters gems, at will, And show their zeal, and hide their want of skill.
-- Alexander Pope

#Skills #Want #Virtue

The time shall come, when, free as seas or wind, Unbounded Thames shall flow for all mankind, Whole nations enter with each swelling tide, And seas but join the regions they divide; Earth's distant ends our glory shall behold, And the new world launch forth to seek the old.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wind #Sea #World

Then sculpture and her sister arts revived; stones leaped to form, and rocks began to live.
-- Alexander Pope

#Art #Rocks #Sculpture

Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow; The rest is all but leather and prunello.
-- Alexander Pope

#Men #Want #He Man

I have more zeal than wit.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wit #Zeal

And more than echoes talk along the walls.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wall #Echoes

Oh! blest with temper, whose unclouded ray Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day.
-- Alexander Pope

#Cheerful #Rays #Morrow

The hog that ploughs not, not obeys thy call, Lives on the labours of this lord of all.
-- Alexander Pope

#Lord #Swine #Hog

The heart resolves this matter in a trice, "Men only feel the smart, but not the vice.
-- Alexander Pope

#Smart #Heart #Men

But see, Orion sheds unwholesome dews; Arise, the pines a noxious shade diffuse; Sharp Boreas blows, and nature feels decay, Time conquers all, and we must time obey.
-- Alexander Pope

#Winter #Blow #Dew

Vices and virtues are of a strange nature, for the more we have, the fewer we think we have.
-- Alexander Pope

#Thinking #Vices #Strange

Calm, thinking villains, whom no faith could fix, Of crooked counsels and dark politics.
-- Alexander Pope

#Dark #Thinking #Calm

Know then, unnumber'd Spirits round thee fly, The light Militia of the lower sky.
-- Alexander Pope

#Light #Sky #Spirit

Heaven forming each on other to depend, A master, or a servant, or a friend, Bids each on other for assistance call, Till one man's weakness grows the strength of all.
-- Alexander Pope

#Men #Heaven #Weakness

Virtue, I grant you, is an empty boast; But shall the dignity of vice be lost?
-- Alexander Pope

#Vices #Dignity #Virtue

What riches give us let us then inquire: Meat, fire, and clothes. What more? Meat, clothes, and fire. Is this too little?
-- Alexander Pope

#Fire #Clothes #Giving

And not a vanity is given in vain.
-- Alexander Pope

#Vanity #Vain #Given

And binding nature fast in fate, Left free the human will.
-- Alexander Pope

#Fate #Humans #Human Will

Silence! coeval with eternity! thou wert ere Nature's self began to be; thine was the sway ere heaven was formed on earth, ere fruitful thought conceived creation's birth.
-- Alexander Pope

#Self #Silence #Heaven

Expression is the dress of thought, and still Appears more decent as more suitable; A vile conceit in pompous words express'd, Is like a clown in regal purple dress'd.
-- Alexander Pope

#Expression #Purple #Style

Tis use alone that sanctifies expense And splendor borrow all her rays from sense.
-- Alexander Pope

#Rays #Use #Splendor

But would you sing, and rival Orpheus' strain. The wond'ring forests soon should dance again; The moving mountains hear the powerful call. And headlong streams hand listening in their fall!
-- Alexander Pope

#Powerful #Moving #Fall

The approach of night The skies yet blushing with departing light, When falling dews with spangles deck'd the glade, And the low sun had lengthen'd ev'ry shade.
-- Alexander Pope

#Fall #Twilight #Night

Fool, 'tis in vain from wit to wit to roam: Know, sense, like charity, begins at home.
-- Alexander Pope

#Home #Charity #Fool

Pretty! in amber to observe the forms Of hairs, of straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms! The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare, But wonder how the devil they got there.
-- Alexander Pope

#Hair #Devil #Amber

With the mistake your life goes in reverse. Now you can see exactly what you did Wrong yesterday and wrong the day before And each mistake leads back to something worse.
-- Alexander Pope

#Mistake #Yesterday #Reverse

Poets like painters, thus unskilled to trace The naked nature and the living grace, With gold and jewels cover ev'ry part, And hide with ornaments their want of art. True wit is Nature to advantage dressed, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.
-- Alexander Pope

#Art #Jewels #Grace

For wit and judgment often are at strife, Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife.
-- Alexander Pope

#Men #Wife #Aids

Oh, when shall Britain, conscious of her claim, Stand emulous of Greek and Roman fame? In living medals see her wars enroll'd, And vanquished realms supply recording gold?
-- Alexander Pope

#War #Greek #Gold

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

#Father #Grief #Joy

Whether the darken'd room to muse invite, Or whiten'd wall provoke the skew'r to write; In durance, exile, Bedlam, or the Mint, Like Lee or Budgel I will rhyme and print.
-- Alexander Pope

#Wall #Writing #Rooms

What Conscience dictates to be done, Or warns me not to do; This teach me more than Hell to shun, That more than Heav'n pursue.
-- Alexander Pope

#Done #Hell #Teach