Edward Young - Night-Thoughts (1710)

50 Sourced Quotes

View all Edward Young Quotes
Thy purpose firm is equal to the deed:
Who does the best his circumstance allows
Does well, acts nobly; angels could no more.

Edward Young
Affliction is the good man's shining scene; prosperity conceals his brightest ray; as night to stars, woe lustre gives to man.

Edward Young
Ah, how unjust to Nature and himself
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man!

Edward Young
The knell, the shroud, the mattock, and the grave,
The deep damp vault, the darkness and the worm.

Edward Young
Heaven's Sovereign saves all beings but himself
That hideous sight,—a naked human heart.

Edward Young
While man is growing, life is in decrease;
And cradles rock us nearer to the tomb.
Our birth is nothing but our death begun.

Edward Young
Tis immortality, 'tis that alone, Amid life's pains, abasements, emptiness, The soul can comfort, elevate, and fill. That only, and that amply this performs.

Edward Young
What is a miracle?--'Tis a reproach, 'Tis an implicit satire on mankind; And while it satisfies, it censures too.

Edward Young
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, how complicate, how wonderful is man! Distinguished link in being's endless chain! Midway from nothing to the Deity! Dim miniature of greatness absolute! An heir of glory! A frail child of dust! Helpless immortal! Insect infinite! A worm! A God!

Edward Young
Age should fly concourse, cover in retreat defects of judgment, and the will subdue; walk thoughtful on the silent, solemn shore of that vast ocean it must sail so soon.

Edward Young
Where, where for shelter shall the guilty fly, When consternation turns the good man pale?

Edward Young
The spider's most attenuated thread Is cord, is cable, to man's tender tie On earthly bliss; it breaks at every breeze.

Edward Young
Sense is our helmet, wit is but the plume; The plume exposes, 'tis our helmet saves. Sense is the diamond, weighty, solid, sound; When cut by wit, it casts a brighter beam; Yet, wit apart, it is a diamond still.

Edward Young
The chamber where the good man meets his fate
Is privileg'd beyond the common walk
Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven.

Edward Young
And can eternity belong to me, Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour?

Edward Young
The man who consecrates his hours by vigorous effort, and an honest aim, at once he draws the sting of life and Death; he walks with nature; and her paths are peace.

Edward Young
Fame is the shade of immortality, And in itself a shadow. Soon as caught, Contemn'd; it shrinks to nothing in the grasp.

Edward Young
O! lost to virtue, lost to manly thought, Lost to the noble sallies of the soul! Who think it solitude to be alone.

Edward Young
We nothing know, but what is marvellous; Yet what is marvellous, we can't believe.

Edward Young
Leisure is pain; take off our chariot wheels; how heavily we drag the load of life!

Edward Young
Who lives to Nature, rarely can be poor ; who lives to fancy, never can be rich.

Edward Young
Of man's miraculous mistakes, this bears The palm, "That all men are about to live."

Edward Young
Body and soul, like peevish man and wife, United jar, and yet are loth to part.

Edward Young
Distinguisht Link in Being's endless Chain!
Midway from Nothing to the Deity!

Edward Young
Ocean into tempest wrought, To waft a feather, or to drown a fly.

Edward Young
Why all this toil for triumphs of an hour? What tho' we wade in Wealth, or soar in Fame? Earth's highest station ends in 'Here he lies;' and 'Dust to dust' concludes the noblest songs.

Edward Young
Like our shadows,
Our wishes lengthen as our sun declines.

Edward Young
And what its worth, ask death-beds; they can tell.

Edward Young
The bell strikes one. We take no note of time
But from its loss.

Edward Young
Beautiful as sweet!
And young as beautiful! and soft as young!
And gay as soft! and innocent as gay.

Edward Young