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Destiny: Quotations from Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations
My death and life, My bane and antidote, are both before me.— ADDISON Cato. Act V. Sc. 1.
Life treads on life, and heart on heart; We press too close in church and mart To keep a dream or grave apart.— E. B. BROWNING — A Vision of Poets.
Conclusion. Born in the garret, in the kitchen bred.— BYRON — A Sketch. L. 1.
Flung from the rock, on Ocean's foam, to sail, For I am a weed, Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's breath prevail.— BYRON — Childe Harold. Canto III. St. 2.
There comes For ever something between us and what We deem our happiness.— BYRON — Sardanapalus. Act I. Sc. 2.
"Whom the gods love die young," was said of yore.— BYRON — Don Juan. Canto IV. St. 12.
All has its date below; the fatal hour Was register'd in Heav'n ere time began. We turn to dust, and all our mightiest works Die too.— COWPER — The Task. Bk. V. The Winter Morning Walk. L. 540.
Not heaven itself upon the past has power; But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.— DRYDEN — Imitation of Horace. Bk. I. Ode XXIX. L. 71.
,-will make Art and power will go on as they have day out of night, time out of space, and done space out of time.— EMERSON — Society and Solitude.
Work and Days. ? If the Take life too seriously, and what is it morning wake us to no new joys, if the worth? If the morning wake us to no new evening bring us not the hope of new pleasures , is it worth while to dress and undress? Does the sun shine on me to-day that I may reflect on yesterday? That I may endeavour to foresee and to control what can neither be foreseen nor controlled-the destiny of to-morrow?— GOETHE — Egmont. Lewes' Life of
Goethe. That each thing, both in small and in great, fulfilleth the task which destiny hath set down. S. HIPPOCRATES. All, soon or late, are doom'd that path to tread.— HOMER — The Odyssey. Bk. XII. L. 31.
Pope's trans. No living man can send me to the shades Before my time; no man of woman born, Coward or brave, can shun his destiny.— HOMER — The Iliad. Bk. VI. L. 623.
Bryant's trans. Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing, Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness: So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another, Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.— LONGFELLOW — Tales of a Wayside Inn.
The Theologian's Tale. Elizabeth. Pt. IV. What a glorious thing human life is, *** and how glorious man's destiny!— LONGFELLOW — Hyperion. Bk. II. Ch. VI.
The future works out great men's destinies : The present is enough for common souls, Who, never looking forward, are indeed Mere clay wherein the footprints of their age Are petrified forever.— LOWELL — Act for Truth.
There are certain events which to each man's life are as comets to the earth, seemingly strange and erratic portents; distinct from the ordinary lights which guide our course and mark our seasons, yet true to their own laws, potent in their own influences.— BULWER-LYTTON — What Will He Do
C. with It? Bk. II. Ch. XIV. Alas! how easily things go wrong! A sigh too deep, or a kiss too long, And then comes a mist and a weeping rain, And life is never the same again.— GEORGE MACDONALD — Phantastes. A
Fairy Story. Our days and nights Have sorrows woven with delights.— MALHERBE — To Cardinal Richelieu.
Longfellow's trans. They only fall, that strive to move, Or lose, that care to keep. OWEN MEREDITH (Lord Lytton)-The Wanderer. Bk. III. Futility. St. 6. Unseen hands delay The coming of what oft seems close in ken, And, contrary, the moment, when we say "'Twill never come!" comes on us even then. OWEN MEREDITH (Lord Lytton)- Thomas Muntzer to Martin Luther. L. 382. We are but as the instrument of Heaven. Our work is not design, but destiny. OWEN MEREDITH (Lord Lytton)- Clytemnestra. Pt. XIX. We are what we must And not what we would be. I know that one hour Assures not another. The will and the power Are diverse. OWEN MEREDITH (Lord Lytton)- Lucile. Pt. I. Canto III. St. 19. The irrevocable Hand That opes the year's fair gate, doth ope and shut The portals of our earthly destinies; We walk through blindfold, and the noiseless doors Close after us, forever.— D. M. MULOCK — April.
Every man meets his Waterloo at last.— WENDELL PHILLIPS — Speech.
Nov. 1, 1859. He whom the gods love dies young, while he is in health, has his senses and his judgment sound.— PLAUTUS — Bacchid. IV. 7, 18.
Alive ridiculous, and dead forgot!— POPE — Moral Essays. Ep. II. L. 248.
Oh blindness to the future! kindly given, That each may fill the circle mark'd by heav'n; Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish, or a sparrow fall. Pope-Essay on Man. Ep. I. L. 85. We met, hand to hand, We clasped hands close and fast, As close as oak and ivy stand; But it is past: Come day, come night, day comes at last.— CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI — Twilight. Night. I. St. 1.
A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm.— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act IV. Sc. 3. L. 28.
A man whom both the waters and the wind, In that vast tennis-court, hath made the ball For them to play upon.— Shakespeare — Pericles. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 63.
Farewell! a long farewell, to all my greatness! This is the state of man: to-day he puts forth The tender leaves of hope; to-morrow blossoms, And bears his blushing honours thick upon him: The third day comes a frost, a killing frost, And, when he thinks, good easy man, full surely His greatness is a-ripening, nips his root, And then he falls, as I do.— Shakespeare — Henry VIII. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 351.
For it is a knell That summons thee to heaven or to hell.— Shakespeare — Macbeth. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 63.
S. For some must watch, while some must sleep; So runs the world away.— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 284.
Here burns my candle out; ay, here it dies, Which, whiles it lasted, gave King Henry light.— Shakespeare — Henry VI. Pt. III. Act II. Sc. 6. L. 1.
If he had been as you and you as he, You would have slipt like him.— Shakespeare — Measure for Measure. Act II. Sc. 2. Sc. 2. L. 64.
I have touched the highest point of all my greatness: And, from that full meridian of my glory, I haste now to my setting.— Shakespeare — Henry VIII. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 223.
Imperious Cæsar, dead and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw!— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 234.
Let Hercules himself do what he may, The cat will mew and dog will have his day.— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 315.
There is divinity in odd numbers, either in nativity, chance or death.— Shakespeare — Merry Wives of Windsor. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 3.
They that stand high have many blasts to shake them; And if they fall, they dash themselves to pieces.— Shakespeare — Richard III. Act I. Sc. 3. L. 259.
Things at the worst will cease, or else climb upward To what they were before.— Shakespeare — Macbeth. Act IV. Sc. 2. L. 24.
Think you I bear the shears of destiny? Have I commandment on the pulse of life?— Shakespeare — King John. Act IV. Sc. 2. L. 91.
We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff, And good from bad find no partition. Henry IV. Pt. II. Act. IV. Sc. 1. L. 194. What a falling-off was there!— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act I. Sc. 5. L. 47.
What is done cannot be now amended.— Shakespeare — Richard III. Act IV. Sc. 4. L. 291.
When I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into Charybdis, your mother.— Shakespeare — Merchant of Venice. Act III. Sc. 5. L. 18.
The seed ye sow, another reaps; The wealth ye find, another keeps; The robes ye weave, another wears; The arms ye forge, another bears.— SHELLEY — Song. To Men of England.
We rest-A dream has power to poison sleep; We rise-One wandering thought pollutes the day.— SHELLEY — Mutability.