John Conington Quotes

O Fortune, cruellest of heavenly powers,
Why make such game of this poor life of ours?

At Orcus' portals hold their lair
Wild Sorrow and avenging Care;
And pale Diseases cluster there,
And pleasureless Decay
Foul Penury, and Fears that kill,
And Hunger, counsellor of ill,
A ghastly presence they:
Suffering and Death the threshold keep,
And with them Death's blood-brother, Sleep.

'Tis come, our fated day of death.

No, had I e'en a hundred tongues,
A hundred mouths, and iron lungs,
Those types of guilt I could not show,
Nor tell the forms of penal woe.

Arise from my bones, my unknown avenger.

Now dews precipitate the night,
And setting stars to rest invite.

An inferior artist's only chance of giving pleasure.

They reach the realms of tranquil bliss. Green spaces folded in with trees,
A paradise of pleasances.

O impotence of man's frail mind To fate and to the future blind, Presumptuous and o'erweening still When Fortune follows at its will!

Virtue's a mere name,
Or 'tis high venture that achieves high aim.

No, trust the Muse: she opes the good man's grave,
And lifts him to the gods.

Dire agonies, wild terrors swarm,
And Death glares grim in many a form.

To die! and unrevenged!' she said,
'Yet let me die.

They can because they think they can.

This to a tyrant master sold
His native land for cursed gold.