Alexander Pope Quotes

English poet (1688–1744)

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Alexander Pope (21 May 1688 – 30 May 1744) was a poet and satirist of the Augustan period and one of its greatest artistic exponents. Considered the foremost English poet of the early 18th century and a master of the heroic couplet, he is best known for satirical and discursive poetry.

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Alternative Names: Pope the Poet • Alexander I Pope • Alexander, I Pope

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Thy voice I seem in ev'ry hymn to hear, with ev'ry bead I drop too soft a tear...

Party is the madness of many, for the gain of a few.

For he lives twice who can at once employ,
The present well, and e’en the past enjoy.

Man never thinks himself happy, but when he enjoys those things which others want or desire.

For, as blushing will sometimes make a whore pass for a virtuous woman, so modesty may make a fool seem a man of sense.

But where's the man, who counsel can bestow,
Still pleas'd to teach, and yet not proud to know?
Unbias'd, or by favour or by spite;
Not dully prepossess'd, nor blindly right;
Though learn'd, well-bred; and though well-bred, sincere;
Modestly bold, and humanly severe?
Who to a friend his faults can freely show,
And gladly praise the merit of a foe?
Blest with a taste exact, yet unconfin'd;
A knowledge both of books and human kind;
Gen'rous converse; a soul exempt from pride;
And love to praise, with reason on his side?

Favours to none, to all she smiles extends; Oft she rejects, but never once offends.

Of all the causes which conspire to blind
Man's erring judgement, and misguide the mind,
What the weak head with strongest bias rules,
Is PRIDE, the never-failing vice of fools.

The world forgetting by the world forgot.

To me what Nature has in charms denied,
Is well by Wit’s more lasting flames supplied.

The Dying Christian to His Soul (1712)

-Vital spark of heav'nly flame!
Quit, oh quit, this mortal frame:
Trembling, hoping, ling'ring, flying,
Oh the pain, the bliss of dying!

Stanza 1.

Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,
Atoms or systems into ruin hurled,
And now a bubble burst, and now a world.

The Quiet Life

Happy the man whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound
Content to breathe his native air
In his own ground.

Whose herd with milk, whose fields with
bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire;
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
In winter, fire.

Blest, who can unconcern’dly find
Hours, days, and years, slide soft away
In health of body; peace of mind;
Quiet by day;

Sound sleep by night; study and ease
Together mix’d; sweet recreation,
And innocence, which most does please
With meditation.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lie.

Know thyself, presume not God to scan;
The proper study of mankind is man.

Solitude

Happy the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air
In his own ground.

Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire;
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
In winter fire.

Blest, who can unconcern’dly find
Hours, days, and years, slide soft away
In health of body, peace of mind,
Quiet by day.

Sound sleep by night; study and ease
Together mix’d, sweet recreation,
And innocence, which most does please
With meditation.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lie.