“Among our crimes oblivion may be set.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden
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Famous John Dryden Quotes
“Long pains, with use of bearing, are half eased.”
Source: The Works of John Dryden: Now First Collected in Eighteen Volumes
“Many things impossible to thought have been by need to full perfection brought.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden
“The perverseness of my fate is such that he's not mine because he's mine too much.”
Source: Dryden: Selected Poems
“To so perverse a sex all grace is vain.”
Source: A Select Collection of the Best Modern English Plays: Vol. III.
“Pleasure never comes sincere to man; but lent by heaven upon hard usury.”
Source: The works of John Dryden: now first collected in eighteen volumes. Illustrated with notes, historical, critical, and explanatory, and a life of the author
“Heroic poetry has ever been esteemed the greatest work of human nature.”
“If we from wealth to poverty descend, Want gives to know the flatterer from the friend.”
Source: Fables, from Boccaccio and Chaucer
Source: Delphi Complete Works of John Dryden (Illustrated)
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden: Containing Original Poems, Tales, and Translations
Source: Delphi Complete Works of John Dryden (Illustrated)
“Uncertain whose the narrowest span,--the clown unread, or half-read gentleman.”
“Riches cannot rescue from the grave, which claims alike the monarch and the slave.”
Source: Poetical works
“Prodigious actions may as well be done, by weaver's issue, as the prince's son.”
“Death only this mysterious truth unfolds, The mighty soul how small a body holds.”
Source: The Major Works
“No king nor nation one moment can retard the appointed hour.”
“An ugly woman in a rich habit set out with jewels nothing can become.”
Source: The Critical and Miscellaneous Prose Works of John Dryden: Now First Collected : with Notes and Illustrations
“Deathless laurel is the victor's due.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden
“Fortune confounds the wise, And when they least expect it turns the dice.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden
“Fortune's unjust; she ruins oft the brave, and him who should be victor, makes the slave.”
Source: The works of John Dryden, with notes and a life of the author by sir W. Scott
“Lucky men are favorites of Heaven.”
Source: The Works of John Dryden, Volume XIV: Plays; The Kind Keeper, The Spanish Fryar, The Duke of Guise, and The Vindication
“They live too long who happiness outlive.”
Source: The Works of John Dryden, Volume IX: Plays: The Indian Emperour, Secret Love, Sir Martin Mar-all
Source: Saggi critici
Source: The works of John Dryden,: now first collected in eighteen volumes
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden: Containing Original Poems, Tales, and Translations
“Ye moon and stars, bear witness to the truth.”
Source: Selections from the poetry of Dryden, including his plays and translations. [The editor's preface signed: C. B., i.e. Charles Bathurst.]
“We by art unteach what Nature taught.”
Source: The Works of John Dryden, Volume IX: Plays: The Indian Emperour, Secret Love, Sir Martin Mar-all
“Old age creeps on us ere we think it nigh.”
Source: The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis: and of Aulus Persius Flaccus
“To tame the proud, the fetter'd slave to free, These are imperial arts.”
Source: Selections from the poetry of Dryden, including his plays and translations. [The editor's preface signed: C. B., i.e. Charles Bathurst.]
“The good we have enjoyed from Heaven's free will, and shall we murmur to endure the ill?”
Source: Dramatic works
“Blown roses hold their sweetness to the last.”
Source: Poetical Works: With a Memoir
Source: Dryden: Selected Poems
“For age but tastes of pleasures youth devours.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden. With Illustrations by John Franklin
“Men's virtues I have commended as freely as I have taxed their crimes.”
Source: Poetical works
“Pity only on fresh objects stays, but with the tedious sight of woes decays.”
Source: Delphi Complete Works of John Dryden (Illustrated)
“Restless at home, and ever prone to range.”
Source: Poetical Works: With a Memoir
Source: Select essays on the belles lettres
Source: Delphi Complete Works of John Dryden (Illustrated)
Source: Selections from the poetry of Dryden, including his plays and translations. [The editor's preface signed: C. B., i.e. Charles Bathurst.]
“Nothing to build, and all things to destroy.”
Source: Poems on Various Occasions: And Translations from Several Authors
“Zeal, the blind conductor of the will.”
Source: Dryden: Selected Poems