Edward Young quotes
Edward Young (1683–1765): English poet. The library holds 226 quotes by Edward Young, drawn from Night Thoughts. Night, Love of Fame, Night thoughts. Night and other works. The 60 below are the most quoted; search the library in the maker for the rest.
Often about: life, time, faith, nature, death, happiness
The best-known Edward Young quotes
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Think naught a trifle, though it small appear; Small sands the mountain, moments make the year, And trifles life.
Love of Fame, Satire vi. Line 208 -
Some for renown, on scraps of learning dote, And think they grow immortal as they quote.
Love of Fame, Satire i. Line 89 -
On every thorn delightful wisdom grows; In every rill a sweet instruction flows.
Love of Fame: Satire I. DR -
None think the great unhappy but the great.
Love of Fame, Satire i. Line 238 -
The man that makes a character makes foes.
To Mr. Pope. Epistle i, Line 28 -
Religion crowns the statesman and the man, Sole source of public and of private peace.
Public Situation of the Kingdom, Line 500 -
The booby father craves a booby son, And by Heaven’s blessing thinks himself undone.
Love of Fame, Satire ii. Line 165 -
For her own breakfast she’ll project a scheme, Nor take her tea without a stratagem.
Love of Fame, Satire vi. Line 190 -
Titles are marks of honest men, and wise; The fool or knave that wears a title lies.
Love of Fame, Satire i. Line 145 -
How blessings brighten as they take their flight!
Night thoughts. Night ii, Line 602 -
Where Nature’s end of language is declin’d, And men talk only to conceal the mind.
Love of Fame, Satire ii. Line 207 -
One to destroy is murder by the law, And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe; To murder thousands takes a specious name, War’s glorious art, and gives immortal fame.
Love of Fame, Satire vii. Line 55 -
Unlearned men of books assume the care, As eunuchs are the guardians of the fair.
Love of Fame, Satire ii. Line 83 -
How commentators each dark passage shun, And hold their farthing candle to the sun.
Love of Fame, Satire vii. Line 97 -
To-morrow is a satire on to-day, And shows its weakness.
The Old Man’s Repose. DR -
Be wise with speed: A fool at forty is a fool indeed.
Love of Fame, Satire II. DR -
In records that defy the tooth of time.
The Statesman’s Creed -
There buds the promise of celestial worth.
The Last Day, Book iii -
The first sure symptom of a mind in health Is rest of heart, and pleasure felt at home.
Night Thoughts, Night VIII. DR -
A man of pleasure is a man of pains.
Night Thoughts. Night viii, Line 793 -
Souls made of fire, and children of the sun, With whom revenge is virtue.
The Revenge, Act v. Sc. 2 -
While man is growing, life is in decrease; And cradles rock us nearer to the tomb. Our birth is nothing but our death begun.
Night Thoughts. Night v, Line 717 -
’Tis elder Scripture, writ by God’s own hand,—Scripture authentic! uncorrupt by man.
Night Thoughts. Night ix, Line 644 -
Woes cluster. Rare are solitary woes; They love a train, they tread each other’s heel.
Night Thoughts. Night iii, Line 63 -
Procrastination is the thief of time.
Night Thoughts. Night i, Line 393 -
Creation sleeps! ’Tis as the general pulse Of life stood still, and Nature made a pause,—An awful pause! prophetic of her end.
Night thoughts. Night i, Line 23 -
Learning makes a man fit company for himself.
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Youth is not rich in time; it may be, poor; part with it, as with money, sparing; pay no moment but in purchase of its worth; and what its worth ask death-beds, they can tell.
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Wishing, of all employments, is the worst.
Night Thoughts. Night iv, Line 71 -
Thoughts shut up want air, and spoil, like bales unopened to the sun.
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The course of Nature is the art of God.
Night Thoughts. Night ix, Line 1267 -
By night an atheist half believes a God.
Night Thoughts. Night v, Line 177 -
The man that blushes is not quite a brute.
Night Thoughts. Night vii, Line 496 -
Death loves a shining mark, a signal blow.
Night Thoughts. Night v, Line 1011 -
Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt, A fool in fashion, save a fool that’s out; His passion for absurdity’s so strong, He cannot bear a rival in the throng.
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Sure as night follows day, Death treads in pleasure’s footsteps round the world, When pleasure treads the path which reason shuns.
Night Thoughts, Night V. DR -
Faith builds a bridge across the gulf of Death, To break the shock blind nature cannot shun, And lands Thought smoothly on the further shore.
Night Thoughts, Night IV. DR -
Heaven’s Sovereign saves all beings but himself That hideous sight,—a naked human heart.
Night Thoughts. Night iii, Line 226 -
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, How complicate, how wonderful is man!
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They that on glorious ancestors enlarge, Produce their debt instead of their discharge.
Love of Fame, Satire i. Line 147 -
The man who builds, and wants wherewith to pay, Provides a home from which to run away.
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The chamber where the good man meets his fate Is privileg’d beyond the common walk Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven.
Night thoughts. Night ii, Line 633 -
The love of praise, howe’er concealed by art, Reigns more or less, and glows in every heart.
Love of Fame, Satire I. DR -
For what are men who grasp at praise sublime, But bubbles on the rapid stream of time, That rise and fall, that swell and are no more, Born and forgot, ten thousand in an hour.
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The love of praise, howe’er conceal’d by art, Reigns more or less, and glows in ev’ry heart.
Love of Fame, Satire i. Line 51 -
We see time’s furrows on another’s brow, And death intrench’d, preparing his assault; How few themselves in that just mirror see!
Night Thoughts. Night v, Line 627 -
Nought treads so silent as the foot of Time; Hence we mistake our autumn for our prime.
Love of Fame, Satire IV. DR -
If not to some peculiar end design’d Study’s the specious trifling of the mind, Or is at best a secondary aim, A chase for sport alone, and not for game.
Love of Fame, Satire ii., Line 67 -
Much learning shows how little mortals know; Much wealth, how little worldlings can enjoy.
Night Thoughts, Night VI. DR -
And can eternity belong to me, Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour?
Night Thoughts, Night I. DR -
Faith builds a bridge from this world to the next.
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Who, for the poor renown of being smart, Would leave a sting within a brother’s heart?
Love of Fame, Satire II. DR -
Ah, how unjust to Nature and himself Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man!
Night thoughts. Night ii, Line 112 -
How science dwindles, and how volumes swell, How commentators each dark passage shun, And hold their farthing candle to the sun!
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Too low they build, who build beneath the stars.
Night Thoughts. Night viii, Line 215 -
Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die.
Night Thoughts. Night iv, Line 843 -
Night, sable goddess! from her ebon throne, In rayless majesty, now stretches forth Her leaden sceptre o’er a slumbering world.
Night thoughts. Night i, Line 18 -
Tired nature’s sweet restorer, balmy Sleep! He, like the world, his ready visit pays Where fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes: Swift on his downy pinions flies from woe, And lights on lids unsullied with a tear.
Night Thoughts, Night I. DR -
Abroad too kind, at home ’tis steadfast hate, And one eternal tempest of debate.
Love of Fame. DR -
At thirty, man suspects himself a fool, Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan. At fifty, chides his infamous delay. Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve. Resolves—and re-resolves; then dies the same.
Where these quotes come from
- Night Thoughts. Night (26 quotes)
- Love of Fame (21 quotes)
- Night thoughts. Night (18 quotes)
- Night Thoughts, Night V. DR (9 quotes)
- Night Thoughts, Night VIII. DR (8 quotes)
- Night Thoughts, Night IV. DR (7 quotes)
- Night Thoughts (7 quotes)
- Night Thoughts, Night I. DR (5 quotes)
Every quote comes from a public-domain edition. How the library was made .