 |
(no category)
|
|
Fortune, that with malicious joyDoes man her slave oppress,Proud of her office to destroy,Is seldom pleasd to bless.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Such subtle Covenants shall be made,Till Peace it self is War in Masquerade.
-John Dryden
|
|
Bravery
|
|
|
Fortune befriends the bold.
-John Dryden
|
|
Career, Vocation
|
|
|
Look around the inhabited world; how few know their own good, or knowing it, pursue.
-John Dryden
|
|
Confidence
|
|
|
For they conquer who believe they can.
-John Dryden
|
|
Conformity & Nonconformity
|
|
|
For all have not the gift of martyrdom.
-John Dryden
|
|
Contentment
|
|
|
Happy the man, and happy he alone, he who can call today his own; he who, secure within, can say, tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
-John Dryden
|
|
Crime
|
|
|
Successful crimes alone are justified.
-John Dryden
|
|
Death
|
|
|
He was exhaled; his great Creator drew His spirit, as the sun the morning dew.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Like pilgrims to the appointed place we tend; The world's an inn, and death the journey's end.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
To die is landing on some distant shore.
-John Dryden
|
|
Decisions
|
|
|
Be slow to resolve, but quick in performance.
-John Dryden
|
|
Divorce
|
|
|
We lov'd, and we lov'd as long as we could
Til our love was lov'd out in us both;
But our marriage is dead, when the pleasure has fled:
'Twas pleasure that made it an oath.
-John Dryden, Marriage
|
|
Endurance
|
|
|
Since every man who lives is born to die, and none can boast sincere felicity, with equal mind, what happens, let us bear, nor joy nor grieve too much for things beyond our care.
-John Dryden
|
|
Envy / Jealousy
|
|
|
Jealousy is the jaundice of the soul.
-John Dryden
|
|
Fanaticism
|
|
|
Railing and praising were his usual themes; and both showed his judgment in extremes. Either over violent or over civil, so everyone to him was either god or devil.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
So over violent, or over civil that every man with him was God or Devil.
-John Dryden
|
|
Fashion
|
|
|
Nor is the people's judgement always true;
The most may err as grossly as the few.
-John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel, Pt I. 781
|
|
Fate & Destiny
|
|
|
All human things are subject to decay,
And, when Fate summons, monarchs must obey;
This Flecknoe found, who like Augustus young
Was call'd to empire, and had govern'd long:
In prose and verse, was own'd, without dispute
Through all the realms of nonsense, absolute.
-John Dryden, Mac Flecknoe
|
|
|
Seek not to know what must not be reveal, for joy only flows where fate is most concealed. A busy person would find their sorrows much more; if future fortunes were known before!
-John Dryden
|
|
Fear
|
|
|
He has not learned the first lesson of life who does not every day surmount a fear.
-John Dryden
|
|
Forgiveness
|
|
|
Reason to rule but mercy to forgive:
The first is the law, the last prerogative.
-John Dryden, The Hind and the Panther, 1687
|
|
|
Repentance is but want of power to sin.
-John Dryden
|
|
Fortune
|
|
|
It is madness to make fortune the mistress of events, because by herself she is nothing and is ruled by prudence.
-John Dryden
|
|
Future, The
|
|
|
Tomorrow do thy worst, I have lived today.
-John Dryden
|
|
Genius
|
|
|
Genius must be born, and never can be taught.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Great wits are sure to madness near allied, and thin partitions do their bounds divide.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Time, place, and action may with pains be wrought, but genius must be born; and never can be taught.
-John Dryden
|
|
Habits
|
|
|
We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Ill habits gather unseen degrees, as brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas.
-John Dryden
|
|
Help
|
|
|
Fool that I was, upon my eagle's wings I bore this wren, till I was tired with soaring, and now he mounts above me.
-John Dryden
|
|
Honor
|
|
|
Woman's honor is nice as ermine; it will not bear a soil.
-John Dryden
|
|
Inheritance
|
|
|
All heiresses are beautiful.
-John Dryden
|
|
Insanity
|
|
|
-John Dryden
|
|
Joy, Excitement
|
|
|
For present joys are more to flesh and blood than a dull prospect of a distant good.
-John Dryden
|
|
Knowledge
|
|
|
All objects lose by too familiar a view.
-John Dryden
|
|
Life
|
|
|
When I consider life, it is all a cheat. Yet fooled with hope, people favor this deceit.
-John Dryden
|
|
Literary
|
|
|
The people have a right supreme
To make their kings, for Kings are made for them.
All Empire is no more than Pow'r in Trust,
Which when resum'd, can be no longer just.
Successionm for the general good design'd,
In its own wrong a Nation cannot bind.
-John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel
|
|
Love
|
|
|
Love works a different way in different minds, the fool it enlightens and the wise it blinds.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Love is love's reward.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Love is not in our choice but in our fate.
-John Dryden
|
|
Marriage
|
|
|
Nature meant me a wife, a silly harmless household Dove, fond without art; and kind without deceit.
-John Dryden
|
|
Maturity
|
|
|
Men are but children of a larger growth, Our appetites as apt to change as theirs, And full as craving too, and full as vain.
-John Dryden
|
|
Military, the
|
|
|
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure.
-John Dryden
|
|
Money
|
|
|
Go miser go, for money sell your soul. Trade wares for wares and trudge from pole to pole, So others may say when you are dead and gone. See what a vast estate he left his son.
-John Dryden
|
|
Opportunity
|
|
|
Thou strong seducer, Opportunity!
-John Dryden
|
|
Pain
|
|
|
Pains of love be sweeter far than all the other pleasures are.
-John Dryden
|
|
Parenting
|
|
|
The sooner you treat your son as a man, the sooner he will be one.
-John Dryden
|
|
Patience
|
|
|
Beware the fury of a patient man.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Oh that my Pow'r to Saving were confin
-John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel, Pt. I, l. 999 - 1005, 1681
|
|
Patriotism
|
|
|
Never was patriot yet, but was a fool.
-John Dryden
|
|
Plagiarism
|
|
|
He invades authors like a monarch; and what would be theft in other poets is only victory in him.
-John Dryden
|
|
Politics
|
|
|
Resolved to ruin or to rule the state.
-John Dryden
|
|
Power
|
|
|
Mighty things from small beginnings grow.
-John Dryden
|
|
Reason
|
|
|
Reason is a crutch for age, but youth is strong enough to walk alone.
-John Dryden
|
|
Revolution
|
|
|
Plots, true or false, are necessary things, to raise up commonwealths, and ruin kings.
-John Dryden
|
|
Royalty, Kings, Queens
|
|
|
Kings fight for empires, madmen for applause.
-John Dryden
|
|
Security
|
|
|
Self-defense is Nature's eldest law.
-John Dryden
|
|
Silence
|
|
|
Not to ask is not be denied.
-John Dryden
|
|
Sin
|
|
|
She feared no danger, for she knew no sin.
-John Dryden
|
|
Thought
|
|
|
Far more numerous are those as such; who think to little and talk to much.
-John Dryden
|
|
Time
|
|
|
Time is the most valuable coin in your life. You and you alone will determine how that coin will be spent. Be careful that you don't let other people spend it for you.
-John Dryden
|
|
Trust
|
|
|
He who trusts secrets to a servant makes him his master.
-John Dryden
|
|
Value
|
|
|
He who would search for pearls must dive below.
-John Dryden
|
|
War
|
|
|
War, he sung, is toil and trouble; Honor but an empty bubble.
-John Dryden
|
|
|
Roused by the lash of his own stubborn tail our lion now will foreign foes assail.
-John Dryden
|
|
Worry
|
|
|
Only man clogs his happiness with care, destroying what is, with thoughts of what may be.
-John Dryden
|
Books by and about John Dryden
