Alexander Pope Quotes

552 Sourced Quotes

Behold the groves that shine with silver frost, their beauty withered, and their verdure lost!

Alexander Pope
Why did I write? What sin to me unknown dipped me in ink, my parents, or my own?

Alexander Pope
There is but one way I know of conversing safely with all men; that is, not by concealing what we say or do, but by saying or doing nothing that deserves to be concealed.

Alexander Pope
The nicest constitutions of government are often like the finest pieces of clock-work, which, depending on so many motions, are therefore more subject to be out of order.

Alexander Pope
The approach of night The skies yet blushing with departing light, When falling dews with spangles deck'd the glade, And the low sun had lengthen'd ev'ry shade.

Alexander Pope
Fool, 'tis in vain from wit to wit to roam: Know, sense, like charity, begins at home.

Alexander Pope
E'en wild heath displays her purple dyes, And 'midst the desert fruitful fields arise.

Alexander Pope
O! Would the Sons of Men 3 once think their Eyes And Reason given them but to study Flies!

Alexander Pope
Still follow sense, of ev'ry art the soul, Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole.

Alexander Pope
We may see the small value God has for riches, by the people he gives them to.

Alexander Pope
The starving chemist in his golden views Supremely blest.

Alexander Pope
See plastic Nature working to this end, The single atoms each to other tend, Attract, attracted to, the next in place Form'd and impell'd its neighbor to embrace.

Alexander Pope
Soft o'er the shrouds aerial whispers breathe, That seemed but zephyrs to the train beneath.

Alexander Pope
A perfect judge will read each word of wit with the same spirit that its author writ.

Alexander Pope
It is observable that the ladies frequent tragedies more than comedies; the reason may be, that in tragedy their sex is deified and adored, in comedy exposed and ridiculed.

Alexander Pope
Giving advice is many times only the privilege of saying a foolish thing one's self, under the pretense of hindering another from doing one.

Alexander Pope
A pear-tree planted nigh:
'Twas charg'd with fruit that made a goodly show,
And hung with dangling pears was every bough.

Alexander Pope
To be, contents his natural desire,
He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.
Go wiser thou! and in thy scale of sense
Weigh thy opinion against Providence.

Alexander Pope
Avoid Extremes; and shun the fault of such Who still are pleas'd too little or too much.

Alexander Pope
Whate'er the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf,
Not one will change his neighbor with himself.

Alexander Pope
Thus Amphisbaena (I have read) At either end assails None knows which leads, or which is led, For both Heads are but Tails.

Alexander Pope
How index-learning turns no student pale,
Yet holds the eel of science by the tail!

Alexander Pope
An atheist is but a mad, ridiculous derider of piety, but a hypocrite makes a sober jest of God and religion; he finds it easier to be upon his knees than to rise to a good action.

Alexander Pope
No more the mounting larks, while Daphne sings, Shall, list'ning, in mid-air suspend their wings.

Alexander Pope
Where beams of imagination play,
the memory's soft figures melt away...

Alexander Pope
Virtue may choose the high or low degree,
'Tis just alike to virtue, and to me;
Dwell in a monk, or light upon a king,
She's still the same belov'd, contented thing.

Alexander Pope
To dazzle let the vain design, To raise the thought and touch the heart, be thine!

Alexander Pope
Live like yourself, was soon my lady's word, And lo! two puddings smok'd upon the board.

Alexander Pope
Fickle Fortune reigns, and, undiscerning, scatters crowns and chains.

Alexander Pope
For critics, as they are birds of prey, have ever a natural inclination to carrion.

Alexander Pope