“Let the fear of danger be a spur to prevent it; he that fears not, gives advantage to the danger.”
“Thy babbling tongue tells golden tales
Of endless treasure;
Thy bounty offers easy sales
Of lasting pleasure;
Thou ask'st the conscience what she ails,
And swear'st to ease her:
There's none can want where thou supply'st:
There's none can give when thou deny'st.
Alas! fond world, thou boast'st; false world thou ly'st.”
“Let all thy joys be as the month of May.”
“And what's a life? - a weary pilgrimage, Whose glory in one day doth fill the stage With childhood, manhood, and decrepit age.”
Source: Judgment and Mercy for Afflicted Souls: Or, Meditations, Soliloquies, and Prayers. New Ed., with a Biographical and Critical Introd. by Reginalde Wolfe
“Is not this lily pure? What fuller can procure A white so perfect, spotless clear As in this flower doth appear?”
Source: Emblems, divine and moral; The school of the heart [really by C. Harvey] and Hieroglyphies of the life of man
“What treasures here do Mammon's sons behold! Yet know that all that which glitters is not gold.”
“Neutrality is dangerous, whereby thou becomest a necessary prey to the conqueror.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“Obedience to truth known, is the king's highway to that which is still beyond us.”
“Let the ground of all thy religious actions be obedience; examine not why it is commanded, but observe it because it is commanded. True obedience neither procrastinates nor questions.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“Scandal breeds hatred; hatred begets division; division makes faction, and faction brings ruin.”
Source: Enchiridion: containing institutions, divine ... moral
“He that discovers himself, till he hath made himself master of his desires, lays himself open to his own ruin, and makes himself prisoner to his own tongue.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“See, here's a shadow found; the human nature Is made th' umbrella to the Deity, To catch the sunbeams of thy just Creator; Beneath this covert thou may'st safely lie.”
Source: Emblems
“Death's a fable. Did not Heaven inspire your equal Elements with living Fire blown from the Spring of Life? Is not that breath Immortal? Come; ye are as free from death as He that made ye: Can the flames expire which he kindled?”
“Mark, how the ready hands of Death prepare: His bow is bent, and he hath notch'd his dart; He aims, he levels at thy slumb'ring heart: The wound is posting, O be wise, beware.”
Source: Emblems, divine and moral; The school of the heart [really by C. Harvey] and Hieroglyphies of the life of man
“How is the anxious soul of man befool'd in his desire, That thinks an hectic fever may be cool'd in flames of fire?”
Source: Emblems divine and moral: together with hieroglyphics of the life of man
“The strong desires of man's insatiate breast may stand possess'd Of all that earth can give; but earth can give no rest.”
Source: Quarles' emblems, illustr. by C. Bennett and W.H. Rogers
“A despairing heart is the true prophet of approaching evil; his actions may weave the webs of Fortune, but not break them.”
Source: Enchiridion: Containing Institutions Divine Contemplative Practical: Moral Ethical Oeconomical Political
“If thou desire to see thy child virtuous, let him not see his father's vices: thou canst not rebuke that in them, that they behold practised in thee; till reason be ripe, examples direct more than precepts: such as thy behaviour is before thy children's faces, such commonly is theirs behind their parents' backs.”
“Whose gold is double with a careful hand, His cares are double.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“Immortal life is something to be earned, By slow self-conquest, comradeship with Pain, And patient seeking after higher truths.”
“For trash and toys, And grief-engend'ring joys, What torment seems too sharp for flesh and blood; What bitter pills, Compos'd of real ills, Men swallow down to purchase one false good!”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“The suburbs of folly is vain mirth, and profuseness of laughter is the city of fools.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“Use law and physic only for necessity; they that use them otherwise abuse themselves unto weak bodies, and light purses; they are good remedies, bad businesses, and worse recreations.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“God hath given to mankind a common library, His creatures; to every man a proper book, himself being an abridgment of all others. If thou read with understanding, it will make thee a great master of philosophy, and a true servant of the divine Author: if thou but barely read, it will make thee thine own wise man and the Author's fool.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“As there is no worldly gain without some loss, so there is no worldly loss without some gain; if thou hast lost thy wealth, thou hast lost some trouble with it; if thou art degraded from thy honor, thou art likewise freed from the stroke of envy; if sickness hath blurred thy beauty, it hath delivered thee from pride. Set the allowance against the loss, and thou shalt find no loss great; he loses little or nothing, that reserves himself.”
Source: Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles
“Lust is a sharp spur to vice, which always putteth the affections into a false gallop.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“Lust is an immoderate wantonness of the flesh, a sweet poison, a cruel pestilence; a pernicious poison, which weakeneth the body of man, and effeminateth the strength of the heroic mind.”
Source: Poetical Works: And, Quarles' Emblems
“O lust, thou infernal fire, whose fuel is gluttony; whose flame is pride, whose sparkles are wanton words; whose smoke is infamy; whose ashes are uncleanness; whose end is hell.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“Nor fire, nor rocks, can stop our furious minds, Nor waves, nor winds.”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“Toyish airs please trivial ears.”
Source: Emblems, divine and moral; The school of the heart [really by C. Harvey] and Hieroglyphies of the life of man
“Yet, sluggard, wake, and gull thy soul no more With earth's false pleasures, and the world's delight, Whose fruit is fair and pleasing to the sight, But sour in taste, false as the putrid core: Thy flaring glass is gems at her half light; She makes thee seeming rich, but truly poor: She boasts a kernel, and bestows a shell; Performs an inch of her fair-promis'd ell: Her words protest a heav'n; her works produce a hell.”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“The worldly wisdom of the foolish man Is like a sieve, that does alone retain The grosser substance of the worthless bran: But thou, my soul, let thy brave thoughts disdain So coarse a purchase: O be thou a fan To purge the chaff, and keep the winnow'd grain: Make clean thy thoughts, and dress thy mixt desires: Thou art Heav'n's tasker, and thy God requires The purest of thy flow'r, as well as of thy fires.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“God is alpha and omega in the great world: endeavor to make him so in the little world; make him thy evening epilogue and thy morning prologue; practice to make him thy last thought at night when thou sleepest, and thy first thought in the morning when thou awakest; so shall thy fancy be sanctified in the night, and thy understanding rectified in the day; so shall thy rest be peaceful, thy labors prosperous, thy life pious, and thy death glorious.”
Source: Enchiridion: Containing Institutions Divine Contemplative Practical: Moral Ethical Oeconomical Political
“Whosoever obeyeth the devil, casteth himself down: for the devil may suggest, compel he cannot.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“See how the world (whose chaste and pregnant womb Of late conceiv'd, and brought forth nothing ill) Is now degenerated, and become A base adult'ress, whose false births do fill The earth with monsters, monsters that do roam And rage about, and make a trade to kill: Now glutt'ny paunches, and avarice a pawn; Pale envy pines, pride swells, and sloth begins to yawn.”
Source: Quarles' Emblems
“Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.”
Source: Poetical Works: And, Quarles' Emblems
“It is a most just punishment, that man should lose that freedom, which man could not use, yet had power to keep, if he would; and that he who had knowledge to do what was right, and did not should be deprived of the knowledge of what was right; and that he who would not do righteously, when he had the power, should lose the power to do it, when he had the will.”
Source: Emblems, divine and moral; The school of the heart [really by C. Harvey] and Hieroglyphies of the life of man
“Alas! fond child, How are thy thoughts beguil'd To hope for honey from a nest of wasps? Thou may'st as well Go seek for ease in hell, Or sprightly nectar from the mouths of asps. The world's a hive, From whence thou canst derive No good, but what thy soul's vexation brings: But case thou meet Some petty-petty sweet, Each drop is guarded with a thousand stings.”
Source: Emblems divine and moral
“Let grace conduct thee to the paths of peace.”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“False world, thou ly'st: thou canst not lend The least delight: Thy favours cannot gain a friend, They are so slight.”
Source: Emblems divine and moral, together with Hieroglyphics of the life of man
“Take heed thou trust not the deceitful lap Of wanton Dalilah; the world's a trap.”
Source: Emblems, divine and moral, with a sketch of the life and times of the author
“The grave is sooner cloy'd than men's desire.”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“What well-advised ear regards What earth can say? Thy words are gold, but thy rewards Are painted clay.”
Source: Emblems, Divine and Moral: The School of the Heart ; And, Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man
“A lamb appears a lion, and we fear Each bush we see's a bear.”
Source: Emblems divine and moral: together with hieroglyphics of the life of man
“Shine Son of glory, and my sinnes are goneLike twinkling Starres before the rising Sunne.”
“Even such is man, whose glory lendsHis life a blaze or two, and ends.”
Source: The Complete Works in Prose and Verse of Francis Quarles
“Death aims with fouler spiteAt fairer marks.”
“Sweet Phosphor, bring the dayWhose conquering rayMay chase these fogs;Sweet Phosphor, bring the day!Sweet Phosphor, bring the day!Light will repayThe wrongs of night;Sweet Phosphor, bring the day!”
“The slender debt to Nature's quickly paid,Discharged, perchance, with greater ease than made.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
“My soul, the seas are rough, and thou a stranger In these false coasts; O keep aloof; there's danger; Cast forth thy plummet; see, a rock appears; Thy ships want sea-room; make it with thy tears.”
Source: The Poetical Works of Richard Crashaw and Quarles' Emblems
