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Absence
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Absence from whom we love is worse than death, and frustrates hope severer than despair.
-William Cowper
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Absence of proof is not proof of absence.
-William Cowper
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Anger
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A fretful temper will divide the closest knot that may be tied, by ceaseless sharp corrosion; a temper passionate and fierce may suddenly your joys disperse at one immense explosion.
-William Cowper
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Chance
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A fool must now and then be right, by chance.
-William Cowper
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Conscience
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The innocent seldom find an uncomfortable pillow.
-William Cowper
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Enthusiasm
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No wild enthusiast could rest, till half the world like him was possessed.
-William Cowper
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Evil
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Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon their knees.
-William Cowper
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Fanaticism
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Fanaticism soberly defined, is the false fire of an over heated mind.
-William Cowper
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Friends
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The man that hails you Tom or Jack, and proves by thumps upon your back how he esteems your merit, is such a friend, that one had need be very much his friend indeed to pardon or to bear it.
-William Cowper
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Glory
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You told me, I remember, glory, built
On selfish principles, is shame and guilt;
The deeds that men admire as half divine,
Stark naught, because corrupt in their design.
Strange doctrine this! that without scruple tears
The laurel that the very lightning spares;
Brings down the warrior
http://www.ccel.org/c/cowper/works/table-talk.htm
-William Cowper, Table Talk
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God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never-failing skill,
He treasures up His bright designs,
And works His sovereign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust Him for His grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan His work in vain:
God is His own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
-William Cowper, Light Shining out of Darkness
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Guests
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Visitors are insatiable devourers of time, and fit only for those who, if they did not visit, would do nothing.
-William Cowper
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Hope
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The darkest day, If you live till tomorrow will have past away.
-William Cowper
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Humor
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A man renowned for repartee will seldom scruple to make free with friendship's finest feeling, will thrust a dagger at your breast, and say he wounded you in jest, by way of balm for healing.
-William Cowper
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Insanity
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Man disavows, and Deity disowns me: hell might afford my miseries a shelter; therefore hell keeps her ever-hungry mouths all bolted against me.
-William Cowper
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Kindness
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Man may dismiss compassion from his heart, but God never will.
-William Cowper
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Knowledge
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Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass, the mere materials with which wisdom builds, till smoothed and squared and fitted to its place, does but encumber whom it seems to enrich. Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much; wisdom is humble that he knows no more.
-William Cowper
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Knowledge is proud that it knows so much; Wisdom is humble that it knows no more.
-William Cowper
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Laziness
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The life of ease is a difficult pursuit.
-William Cowper
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Life
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A life of ease is a difficult pursuit.
-William Cowper
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Nation, Nationality, Nationalism
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God made the country and man made the town.
-William Cowper
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Nature
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Nature is a good name for an effect whose cause is God.
-William Cowper
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Praise
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O, popular applause! what heart of man is proof against thy sweet, seducing charms?
-William Cowper
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Pride
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A self-made man? Yes, and one who worships his creator.
-William Cowper
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Profanity, Swearing, Vulgarity
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It chills my blood to hear the blest Supreme rudely appealed to on each trifling theme.
-William Cowper
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Professionalism
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How much a dunce that has been sent to roam, excels a dunce that has been kept at home.
-William Cowper
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Purpose
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Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.
-William Cowper
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Thus happiness depends, as nature shows, less on exterior things than most suppose.
-William Cowper
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Regret & Remorse
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Remorse, the fatal egg that pleasure laid.
-William Cowper
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Remorse begets reform.
-William Cowper
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Religion
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Religion! what treasure untold resides in that heavenly word!
-William Cowper
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The parson knows enough who knows a Duke.
-William Cowper
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Rest, Leisure
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Absence of occupation is not rest; A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
-William Cowper
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Sadness
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The path of sorrow and that path alone, leads to a land where sorrow is unknown.
-William Cowper
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Satire
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Unless a love of virtue light the flame,
Satire is, more than those he brands, to blame;
He hides behind a magisterial air
He own offences, and strips others' bare.
-William Cowper, Charity (l. 490)
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Sin
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No one was ever scolded out of their sins.
-William Cowper
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Slavery
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Forced from home, and all its pleasures, afric coast I left forlorn; to increase a stranger's treasures, o the raging billows borne. Men from England bought and sold me, paid my price in paltry gold; but, though theirs they have enroll'd me, minds are never to be sold.
-William Cowper
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I pity them greatly, but I must be mum, for how could we do without sugar and rum?
-William Cowper
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Solitude
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Oh to have a lodge in some vast wilderness. Where rumors of oppression and deceit, of unsuccessful and successful wars may never reach me anymore.
-William Cowper
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Oh for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumour of oppression and deceit,
Of unsuccessful or successful war,
Might never reach me more.
-William Cowper, Task
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Teaching
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Once more I would adopt the graver style -- a teacher should be sparing of his smile.
-William Cowper
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Trust
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Candid and generous and just. Boys care but little whom they trust. An error soon corrected -- for who but learns in riper years. That man, when smoothest he appears, is most to be suspected?
-William Cowper
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Truth
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Ceremony leads her bigots forth, prepared to fight for shadows of no worth. While truths, on which eternal things depend, can hardly find a single friend.
-William Cowper
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He is the freeman whom the truth makes free.
-William Cowper, The Task. Book v. The Winter Morning Walk. Line 733.
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Vacations
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I am monarch of all I survey,My right there is none to dispute on;but I wish that I could get awayAnd go home to the village of Bruton.
-William Cowper, The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk
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Variety
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Variety is the very spice of life that gives it all its flavour.
-William Cowper
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Books by and about William Cowper
