Abraham Cowley Quotations

Hope is the most hopeless thing of all.

Why to mute fish should'st thou thyself discoverAnd not to me, thy no less silent lover?

When Israel was from bondage led,Led by the Almighty's handFrom out of foreign land,The great sea beheld and fled.

Awake, awake, my Lyre!And tell thy silent master's humble taleIn sounds that may prevail;Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire:Though so exalted sheAnd I so lowly beTell her, such different notes make all thy harmony.

The Sunflow'r, thinking 'twas for him foul shame To nap by daylight, strove t' excuse the blame; It was not sleep that made him nod, he said, But too great weight and largeness of his head.

What shall I do to be for ever known, And make the age to come my own?

Thus would I double my life's fading space;For he that runs it well, runs twice his race.

The present is an eternal now.

The present is all the ready money Fate can give.

Neither the praise nor the blame is our own.