Thomas Gray Quotes

90 Sourced Quotes

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

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

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

Thomas Gray
Weave the warp, and weave the woof,
The winding sheet of Edward's race.
Give ample room and verge enough,
The Characters of hell to trace.

Thomas Gray
For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er resigned,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing ling'ring look behind?

Thomas Gray
And hie him home, at evening's close,
To sweet repast and calm repose.

Thomas Gray
Dear, as the light that visits these sad eyes;
Dear, as the ruddy drops that warm my heart.

Thomas Gray
See the wretch that long has tost
On the thorny bed of pain,
At length repair his vigour lost,
And breathe and walk again:
The meanest floweret of the vale,
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies,
To him are opening paradise.

Thomas Gray
Daughter of Jove, relentless power,
Thou tamer of the human breast,
Whose iron scourge and tort'ring hour
The bad affright, afflict the best!

Thomas Gray
Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;
They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.
Bright Rapture calls, and soaring, as she sings,
Waves in the eye of Heav'n her many-colour'd wings.

Thomas Gray
Behind the steps that Misery treads
Approaching Comfort view:
The hues of bliss more brightly glow
Chastised by sabler tints of woe,
And blended form, with artful strife,
The strength and harmony of life.

Thomas Gray
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.

Thomas Gray
T'was Spring, t'was Summer, all was gay
Now Autumn bears a cloud brow
The flowers of Spring are swept way
And Summer fruits desert the bough

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

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

Thomas Gray
To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay.

Thomas Gray
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight,
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul!

Thomas Gray
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.

Thomas Gray
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r
The moping owl does to the moon complain.

Thomas Gray
Can storied urn, or animated bust
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of death?

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

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

Thomas Gray
When love could teach a monarch to be wise,
And gospel-light first dawn'd from Bullen's eyes.

Thomas Gray
But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page
Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repressed their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Thomas Gray
Still as they run they look behind,
They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.

Thomas Gray
Now my weary lips I close;
Leave me, leave me to repose!

Thomas Gray
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,
The rude Forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

Thomas Gray
He passed the flaming bounds of place and time:
The living throne, the sapphire-blaze,
Where angels tremble, while they gaze,
He saw; but blasted with excess of light,
Closed his eyes in endless night.

Thomas Gray