Quotes from John Dryden

Railing in other men may be a crime, But ought to pass for mere instinct in him: Instinct he follows and no further knows, For to write verse with him is to transprose.

It's a hard world, neighbors, if a man's oath must be his master.

He was exhaled; his great Creator drew His spirit, as the sun the morning dew.

Thus, while the mute creation downward bend Their sight, and to their earthly mother ten, Man looks aloft; and with erected eyes Beholds his own hereditary skies.

For your ignorance is the mother of your devotion to me.

We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.

As poetry is the harmony of words, so music is that of notes.

Self-defense is Nature's eldest law.

The fool of nature stood with stupid eyes And gaping mouth, that testified surprise.

Nature meant me A wife, a silly, harmless, household dove, Fond without art, and kind without deceit.

Good sense and good-nature are never separated, though the ignorant world has thought otherwise. Good-nature, by which I mean beneficence and candor, is the product of right reason.

By viewing nature, nature's handmaid art, Makes mighty things from small beginnings grow: Thus fishes first to shipping did impart, Their tail the rudder, and their head the prow.

But when to sin our biased nature leans, The careful Devil is still at hand with means; And providently pimps for ill desires.

For Art may err but Nature cannot miss.

Possess your soul with patience.

The fortitude of a Christian consists in patience, not in enterprises which the poets call heroic, and which are commonly the effects of interest, pride and worldly honor.

Never was patriot yet, but was a fool.

At home the hateful names of parties cease, And factious souls are wearied into peace.

Imagining is in itself the very height and life of poetry, which, by a kind of enthusiasm or extraordinary emotion of the soul, makes it seem to us that we behold those things which the poet paints.

Satire is a kind of poetry in which human vices are reprehended.

A satirical poet is the check of the laymen on bad priests.

So poetry, which is in Oxford made An art, in London only is a trade.

They that possess the prince possess the laws.

Damned Neuters in their Middle way of Steering Are neither Fish nor Flesh nor good Red Herring.