Alexander Pope > Quotes

“To err is human, to forgive, divine.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.”
― Alexander Pope

“How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd;”
― Alexander Pope

“Wise wretch! with pleasures too refined to please,
With too much spirit to be e'er at ease,
With too much quickness ever to be taught,
With too much thinking to have common thought:
You purchase pain with all that joy can give,
And die of nothing but a rage to live.”
― Alexander Pope

“What Reason weaves, by Passion is undone.”
― Alexander Pope, Essay on Man and Other Poems

“Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.”
― Alexander Pope

“A little learning is a dangerous thing.
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring;
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
and drinking largely sobers us again.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying in other words that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.”
― Alexander Pope

“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,
The proper study of mankind is Man.
Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,
He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a God or Beast;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such,
Whether he thinks too little or too much;
Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;
Still by himself abused or disabused;
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd;
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!”
― Alexander Pope

“Act well your part; there all the honour lies.”
― Alexander Pope

“You purchase pain with all that joy can give and die of nothing but a rage to live.”
― Alexander Pope

“If you want to know what God thinks about money just look at the people He gives it to. ”
― Alexander Pope

“Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.”
― Alexander Pope

“Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.”
― Alexander Pope

“Words are like Leaves; and where they most abound,
Much Fruit of Sense beneath is rarely found.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“If a man's character is to be abused there's nobody like a relative to do the business.”
― Alexander Pope

“Hope springs eternal in the human breast;
Man never Is, but always To be blest.
The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.”
― Alexander Pope, Essay on Man and Other Poems

“Death, only death, can break the lasting chain;
And here, ev'n then, shall my cold dust remain”
― Alexander Pope

“Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.”
― Alexander Pope, The Rape of the Lock

“All Nature is but art, unknown to thee
All chance, direction, which thou canst not see;
All discord, harmony not understood;
All partial evil, universal good.”
― Alexander Pope

“No woman ever hates a man
for being in love with her;
but mainly a woman hates a
man for being her friend.”
― Alexander Pope

“True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“Our judgments, like our watches, none
go just alike, yet each believes his own”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.”
― Alexander Pope

“Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.”
― Alexander Pope

“Man never thinks himself happy, but when he enjoys those things which others want or desire. ”
― Alexander Pope

“If I am right, Thy grace impart
Still in the right to stay;
If I am wrong, O, teach my heart
To find that better way!”
― Alexander Pope

“Great wits are to madness near allied / And thin partitions do their bounds divide.”
― Alexander Pope

“And die of nothing but a rage to live”
― Alexander Pope

“I am his Highness' dog at Kew;
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?”
― Alexander Pope

“The world forgetting by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!”
― Alexander Pope, Eloisa to Abelard. by Alexander Pope, Esq

“An honest man's the noblest work of God”
― Alexander Pope

“Vice is a monster of so frightful mien
As to be hated needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace.”
― Alexander Pope

“True Wit is Nature to advantage dress'd/ What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd;/ Something whose truth convinced at sight we find,/ That gives us back the image of our mind./ As shades more sweetly recommend the light,/ So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“No one should be ashamed to admit they are wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that they are wiser today than they were yesterday.”
― Alexander Pope

“To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart;”
― Alexander Pope

“Of all the causes which conspire to blind
Man's erring judgement, and misguide the mind,
What the weak head with strongest bias rules,
Is PRIDE, the never-failing vice of fools.”
― Alexander Pope

“Whatever is, is right.”
― Alexander Pope

“chaos of thought and passion, all confus'd.”
― Alexander Pope, Essay on Man and Other Poems

“The wit of cheats,the courage of a whore:Are what ten thousand envy and adore:All,all look up,withreverential awe,At crimes that 'scape,or triumph o'er the law:While truth,worth,wisdom,daily they decry-`Nothing is sacred now but villainy”
― Alexander Pope

“Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night; God said, Let Newton be! and all was light.”
― Alexander Pope

“Order is Heaven’s first law.”
― Alexander Pope

“All forms that perish other forms supply,
(By turns we catch the vital breath and die)
Like bubbles on the sea of matter borne,
They rise, they break, and to that sea return.”
― Alexander Pope, Pope: An Essay on Man

“Dear fatal name! rest ever unreveal'd,
Nor pass these lips in holy silence seal'd.
Hide it, my heart, within that close disguise,
Where mixed with Gods, his lov'd idea lies:
O write it not, my hand - the name appears
Already written - wash it out, my tears!
In vain lost Eloisa weeps and prays,
Her heart still dictates, and her hand obeyes.”
― Alexander Pope

“What dire offence from am'rous causes springs,
What mighty contests rise from trivial things,...”
― Alexander Pope, The Rape of the Lock

“Men must be taught as if you taught them not and things unknown proposed as things forgot.”
― Alexander Pope

“How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd;
Labour and rest, that equal periods keep;
Obedient slumbers that can wake and weep.”
― Alexander Pope, Eloisa to Abelard. by Alexander Pope, Esq

“In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold;
Alike fantastic, if too new, or old:
Be not the first by whom the new are tried,
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.”
― Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

“For he lives twice who can at once employ, The present well, and e’en the past enjoy.”
― Alexander Pope

“Our rural ancestors, with little blest,
Patient of labor when the end was rest,
Indulged the day that housed their annual grain,
With feasts, and off'rings, and a thankful strain.”
― Alexander Pope