Thomas Gray Quotes

90 Sourced Quotes

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Awaits alike the inevitable hour:
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Thomas Gray
To each his suff'rings: all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan,
The tender for another's pain;
Th' unfeeling for his own.
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.

Thomas Gray
Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade!
Ah, fields beloved 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.

Thomas Gray
Some bold adventurers disdain The limits of their little reign, And unknown regions date descry.

Thomas Gray
Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch A broader browner shade; Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech O'er-canopies the glade, Beside some water's rushy brink With me the Muse shall sit, and think.

Thomas Gray
The different steps and degrees of education may be compared to the artificer's operations upon marble; it is one thing to dig it out of the quarry, and another to square it, to give it gloss and lustre, call forth every beautiful spot and vein, shape it into a column, or animate it into a statue.

Thomas Gray
Man's feeble race what ills await!
Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,
And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate!

Thomas Gray
The insect-youth are on the wing,
Eager to taste the honied spring,
And float amid the liquid noon!

Thomas Gray
In buskined measures move Pale Grief and pleasing Pain, With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.

Thomas Gray
Forbad to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind.

Thomas Gray
Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond today.

Thomas Gray
The verse adorn again
Fierce War, and faithful Love,
And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction drest.

Thomas Gray
It has been usual to catch a mouse or two (for form's sake) in public once a year.
On refusing the Laureateship

Thomas Gray
Any fool may write a most valuable book by chance, if he will only tell us what he heard and saw with veracity.

Thomas Gray
In glittering arms and glory dressed,
High he rears his ruby crest.
There the thundering strokes begin,
There the press and there the din;
Talymalfra's rocky shore
Echoing to the battle's roar.

Thomas Gray
Ruin seize thee, ruthless King!
Confusion on thy banners wait,
Though fanned by Conquest's crimson wing
They mock the air with idle state.

Thomas Gray
O'er her warm cheek and rising bosom move
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of Love.

Thomas Gray
And moody madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.

Thomas Gray
The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn.

Thomas Gray
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.

Thomas Gray
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.

Thomas Gray
No dolphin came, no Nereid stirred;
Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard.
A favourite has no friend!

Thomas Gray
The applause of list'ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes.

Thomas Gray
Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate,
Beneath the good how far,—but far above the great.

Thomas Gray
Rich windows that exclude the light,
And passages that lead to nothing.

Thomas Gray
Far from the sun and summer-gale,
In thy green lap was Nature's Darling laid.

Thomas Gray
To brisk notes in cadence beating, glance their many-twinkling feet.

Thomas Gray
Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Thomas Gray
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

Thomas Gray
The Curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Thomas Gray