Best poems
/ page 35 of 84 /
Hudibras: Part 2 - Canto II
© Samuel Butler
Quoth RALPHO, Honour's but a word
To swear by only in a Lord:
In other men 'tis but a huff,
To vapour with instead of proof;
That, like a wen, looks big and swells,
Is senseless, and just nothing else.
Heavenly Wisdom
© John Logan
O Happy is the man who hears
Instruction's warning voice,
And who celestial wisdom makes
His early, only choice.
The Lay of the Laborer
© Thomas Hood
A spade! a rake! a hoe!
A pickaxe, or a bill!
A hook to reap, or a scythe to mow,
A flail, or what ye will
A Radical War Song
© Thomas Babbington Macaulay
Awake, arise, the hour is come,
For rows and revolutions;
The Pastime of Pleasure: Of dysposycyon the II. parte of rethoryke - (til line 3950)
© Stephen Hawes
Of the merualyos argument bytwene Mars and fortune. Ca. xxvij.
3018 Besyde this toure of olde foundacyon
3019 There was a temple strongly edefyed
3020 To the hygh honoure and reputacyon
Olney Hymn 22: Prayer For A Blessing In The Young
© William Cowper
Bestow, dear Lord, upon our youth
The gift of saving grace;
And let the seed of sacred truth
Fall in a fruitful place.
The Pimlico Pavilion
© William Makepeace Thackeray
Ye pathrons of janius, Minerva and Vanius,
Who sit on Parnassus, that mountain of snow,
Descind from your station and make observation
Of the Prince's pavilion in sweet Pimlico.
The Plate Of Gold
© James Henry Leigh Hunt
One day there fell in great Benares' temple-court
A wondrous plate of gold, whereon these words were writ;
"To him who loveth best, a gift from Heaven."
Thereat.
The Ring And The Book - Chapter VI - Giuseppe Caponsacchi
© Robert Browning
Again the morning found me. I will work,
Tie down my foolish thoughts. Thank God so far!
I have saved her from a scandal, stopped the tongues
Had broken else into a cackle and hiss
Around the noble name. Duty is still
Wisdom: I have been wise. So the day wore.
Secret Love
© Amelia Opie
Not one kind look….one friendly word!
Wilt thou in chilling silence sit;
Nor through the social hour afford
One cheering smile, or beam of wit?
Pharsalia - Book IX: Cato
© Marcus Annaeus Lucanus
Such were the words he spake; and soon the fleet
Had dared the angry deep: but Cato's voice
While praising, calmed the youthful chieftain's rage.
Expostulation
© William Cowper
Why weeps the muse for England? What appears
In England's case to move the muse to tears?
The Borough. Letter XIX: The Parish-Clerk
© George Crabbe
WITH our late Vicar, and his age the same,
His clerk, hight Jachin, to his office came;
The like slow speech was his, the like tall slender
Vanitas Vanitatum, Omnia Vanitas
© Anne Brontë
In all we do, and hear, and see,
Is restless Toil and Vanity.
While yet the rolling earth abides,
Men come and go like ocean tides;
To Time
© George Gordon Byron
Time! on whose arbitrary wing
The varying hours must flag or fly,
Whose tardy winter, fleeting spring,
But drag or drive us on to die--
