A DICTIONARY

OF

POETICAL QUOTATIONS.

ARDICATION.

A.

I give this heavy weight from off my head,
And this unwieldy sceptre from my hand,
The pride of kingly sway from out my heart;
With mine own tears I wash away my balm,
With mine own hands I give away my crown,
With mine own tongue deny my sacred state,
With mine own breath release all duteous oaths.
1
ABILITY.

Shaks.: Richard II. Act iv. Sc. 1

I profess not talking: only this, Let each man do his best.

2

Shaks.: 1 Henry IV. Act v. Sc.

Who does the best his circumstance allows,
Does well, acts nobly- angels could no more.

3

ABSENCE.

Young: Night Thoughts. Night ii. Line 91.

What! keep a week away!

Seven days and nights?

Eight score eight hours? and lovers' absent hours,

More tedious than the dial eight score times?

O weary reckoning!

Condemn'd whole years in absence to deplore,
And image charms he must behold no more.

7

Pope: Eloisa to A. Line 361.

Pope: Eloisa to A. Line 47.

No happier task these faded eyes pursue; To read and weep is all they now can do: 8

Of all affliction taught a lover yet
'Tis sure the hardest science to forget!
9
Ye flowers that droop, forsaken by the spring;
Ye birds that, left by summer, cease to sing;
Ye trees that fade, when autumn heats remove,
Say, is not absence death to those who love?
10

Pope: Eloisa to A. Line 189.

Pope: Autumn. Line 27.

Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart untravell'd, fondly turns to thee;
Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain,
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.
11

Goldsmith: Traveller. Line 7.

O Love, if you were only here
Beside me in this mellow light,

Though all the bitter winds should blow,
And all the ways be choked with snow,
"Twould be a true Arabian night!

12

O last love! O first love!

My love with the true heart,

T. B. Aldrich: Latakia.

To think I have come to this your home,
And yet we are apart!

13

Jean Ingelow: Sailing Beyond Seas.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. 14

Thomas Haynes Bayly: Isle of Beauty. Oh! couldst thou but know

With what a deep devotedness of woe

I wept thy absence - o'er and o'er again

Thinking of thee, still thee, till thought grew pain,
And memory, like a drop that, night and day,

Falls cold and ceaseless, wore my heart away!

15

ABSTINENCE.

Moore: Lalla Rookh. V. P. of Khorassan.

Against diseases here the strongest fence
Is the defensive virtue abstinence.

16

Herrick: Aph. Abstinence.

ABUNDANCE.

Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
Of Vallombrosa.1

17

Milton: Par. Lost. Book i. Line 302.

ABUSE

see Curses.

He is deformed, crooked, old, and sere,

Ill-faced, worse-bodied, shapeless every where;
Vicious, ungentle, foolish, blunt, unkind;
Stigmatical in making, worse in mind.

18

Shaks.: Com. of Er. Act iv. Sc. 2.

Thou thread, thou thimble,

Thou yard, three quarters, half-yard, quarter, nail,
Thou flea, thou nit, thou winter cricket thou:
Away thou rag, thou quantity, thou remnant.

As the unthought-on accident is guilty
Of what we wildly do, so we profess

Ourselves to be the slaves of chance, and flies
Of every wind that blows.

21

Shaks.: Wint. Tale. Act iv. Sc. 3.

Our wanton accidents take root, and grow

To vaunt themselves God's laws.

22

ACCOUNT.

Charles Kingsley: Saint's Tragedy. Act ii. Sc. 4.

No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head.

23

Shaks.: Hamlet. Act i. Sc. 5.

Shaks.: Hamlet. Act iii. Sc. 3.

And, how his audit stands, who knows, save heaven? 24

ACHIEVEMENTS.

Great things thro' greatest hazards are achiev'd,

And then they shine.

25 Beaumont and Fletcher: Loyal Subject. Act i. Sc. 5.

ACTION -see Industry.

The evil that men do lives after them;

The good is oft interred with their bones.

Shaks.: Jul. Cæsar. Act iii. Sc. 2.

Shaks.: Othello. Act ii. Sc. 3.

26 Pleasure and action make the hours seem short. 27

Of every noble action, the intent

Is to give worth reward - vice punishment.

28

Beaumont and Fletcher: Captain. Act v. Sc. 5.

1 A beautiful vale about eighteen miles from Florence.

Some place the bliss in action, some in ease, Those call it pleasure, and contentment these. 29

Pope: Essay on Man. Epis. iv. Line 21.

Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,

Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.

30

Fletcher: On an Honest Man's Fortune. Line 35.

Only the actions of the just

Smell sweet and blossom in their dust.

31

James Shirley: Death's Final Conquest. Sc. iii.
ACTIVITY -see Decision, Despatch, Energy, Promptitude.
If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well
It were done quickly.

32

Shaks.: Macbeth. Act i. Sc. 7.

Wise men ne'er sit and wail their loss,

But cheerly seek how to redress their harms. 33

Take the instant way;

Shaks.: 3 Henry VI. Act v. Sc. 4.

For emulation hath a thousand sons,
That one by one pursue. If you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by,
And leave you hindmost.

34

Shaks.: Troil. and Cress. Act iii. Sc. 3.

Celerity is never more admired

Than by the negligent.

35

ACTORS see Stage.

Shaks.: Ant. and Cleo. Act iii. Sc. 7.

A strutting player, whose conceit Lies in his hamstring, and doth think it rich To hear the wooden dialogue and sound "Twixt his stretched footing and the scaffoldage. 36

Shaks.: Troil. and Cress. Act i. Sc. 3.

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,

That he should weep for her? What would he do,
Had he the motive and the cue for passion

That I have? He would drown the stage with tears,
And cleave the general ear with horrid speech;

Make mad the guilty, and appal the free,
Confound the ignorant, and amaze, indeed,
The very faculties of eyes and ears.
37

Shaks.: Hamlet. Act ii. Sc. 2.

Will you see the players well bestowed? .

They are the abstracts and brief chronicles of the time. 38

Shaks.: Hamlet. Act ii. Sc. 2.

Churchill: Apology. Line 206.

The strolling tribe; a despicable race.

39

To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius and to mend the heart,
To make mankind in conscious virtue bold,
Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold;
For this the tragic muse first trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream through every age.
40

ADAPTABILITY.

Pope: Prol. to Addison's Cato.

All things are ready, if our minds be so.

41 ADIEU

Shaks.: Henry V. Act iv. Sc. 3.

see Farewell, Parting.

If we do meet again, why, we shall smile;
If not, why then this parting was well made.
42

Shaks.: Jul. Cæsar. Act v. Sc. 1.

Adieu, adieu! iny native shore

Fades o'er the waters blue;

The night-winds sigh, the breakers roar,
And shrieks the wild sea-mew.

Yon sun that sets upon the sea
We follow in his flight;

Farewell awhile to him and thee,
My native land-good night.

43

Byron: Ch. Harold. Canto 1. St. 13.

ADMONITION -see Advice.

Sum up at night what thou hast done by day;
And in the morning what thou hast to do.
Dress and undress thy soul. Watch the decay
And growth of it. If with thy watch, that too
Be down, then wind both up. Since we shall be
Most surely judged, make thy accounts agree.
44

Herbert: Temple. Church Porch. St. 76.
Be wise with speed;

A fool at forty is a fool indeed.

45

Young: Love of Fame. Satire ii. Line 282.

ADVERSITY- see Affliction.

Such a house broke! So noble a master fallen! all gone! and not One friend, to take his fortune by the arm, And go along with him.

Shaks.: Timon of A. Act iv. Sc. 2

46
This is in thee a nature but infected;
A poor, unmanly melancholy, sprung
From change of fortune.

47 The great man down, you mark his favorite flies, The poor advanced makes friends of enemies.

Shaks.: Timon of A. Act iv. Sc. 3

48

Shaks.: Iamlet. Act iii. Sc. 2.