Thomas Gray Quotes

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds.

Hark, his hands the lyre explore! Bright-eyed Fancy hovering o'er Scatters from her pictured urn Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.

Where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

- Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil

From toil he wins his spirits light, From busy day the peaceful night; Rich, from the very want of wealth, In heaven's best treasures, peace and health.

Ah, happy hills, ah, pleasing shade,
Ah, fields belov'd in vain,
Where once my careless childhood stray'd,
A stranger yet to pain!
I feel the gales, that from ye blow,
A momentary bliss bestow,
As waving fresh their gladsome wing,
My weary soul they seem to soothe,
And, redolent of joy and youth,
To breathe a second spring.

Yet, ah! why should they know their fate,
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies?
Thought would destroy their Paradise.
No more; — where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know, And from her own she learned to melt at others' woe.

Can storied urn, or animated bust Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust, Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, Or busy housewife ply her evening care: No children run to lisp their sire's return, Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Ignorance is bliss.

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor....

Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Now as the Paradisiacal pleasures of the Mahometans consist in playing upon the flute and lying with Houris, be mine to read eternal new romances of Marivaux and Crebillon.

Helm nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor even thy virtues, tyrant, shall avail To save thy secret soul from nightly fears, From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!