Alexander Pope
How happy is the blameless vestal's lot? The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold; Alike fantastic, if too new, or old: Be not the first by whom the new are tried, Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.
An honest man's the noblest work of God.
The ruling passion, be it what it will. The ruling passion conquers reason still.
Of Manners gentle, of Affections mild; In Wit a man; Simplicity, a child.
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Men must be taught as if you taught them not, and things unknown proposed as things forgot.
Order is heaven's first law.
A God without dominion, providence, and final causes, is nothing else but fate and nature.
Woman's at best a contradiction still.
How prone to doubt, how cautious are the wise!
And all who told it added something new, and all who heard it, made enlargements too.
Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.
Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense, and love the offender, yet detest the offence?
The greatest magnifying glasses in the world are a man's own eyes when they look upon his own person.
Remembrance and reflection how allied. What thin partitions divides sense from thought.
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, and wretches hang that jurymen may dine.
Not to go back is somewhat to advance, and men must walk, at least, before they dance.
Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools.
Genius creates, and taste preserves.Collection: Sublime
Sometimes virtue starves while vice is fed.Collection: Vices
Die of a rose in aromatic pain.Collection: Pain
Judges and senates have been bought for gold; Esteem and love were never to be sold.Collection: Judging
Cursed be the verse, how well so e'er it flow, That tends to make one worthy man my foe.Collection: Friendship
That each from other differs, first confess; next that he varies from himself no less.Collection: Next
There is no study that is not capable of delighting us after a little application to it.Collection: Littles
Say first, of god above or man below; what can we reason but from what we know.Collection: Men
Who dies in youth and vigour, dies the best.Collection: Death
Religion blushing, veils her sacred fires, And unawares Morality expires.Collection: Fire
The only time you run out of chances is when you stop taking themCollection: Wise
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.Collection: Inspirational
Sure of their qualities and demanding praise, more go to ruined fortunes than are raised.Collection: Arrogance
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.Collection: Lying
There is a majesty in simplicity.Collection: Simplicity
Simplicity is the mean between ostentation and rusticity.Collection: Mean
All nature mourns, the skies relent in showers; hushed are the birds, and closed the drooping flowers.Collection: Rain
The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'dCollection: Love
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.Collection: Education
Truth needs not flowers of speech.Collection: Truth
As with narrow-necked bottles; the less they have in them, the more noise they make in pouring out.Collection: People
An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie; for an excuse is a lie guarded.Collection: Honesty
Eve left Adam, to meet the Devil in private.Collection: Men
Charm strikes the sight, but merit wins the soul.Collection: Winning
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.Collection: Life
As the twig is bent, so grows the tree.Collection: Tree
Vice is a monster of so frightful mien As to be hated needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace.Collection: Vices
I begin where most people end, with a full conviction of the emptiness of all sorts of ambition, and the unsatisfactory nature of all human pleasures.Collection: Ambition
It often happens that those are the best people whose characters have been most injured by slanderers: as we usually find that to be the sweetest fruit which the birds have been picking at.Collection: Character