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November: Quotations from Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations

O. Then how can any man be said To break an oath he never made?— BUTLER — Hudibras. Pt. II. Canto II. L. 379.

Jack was embarrassed-never hero more, And as he knew not what to say, he swore.— BYRON — The Island. Canto III. St. 5.

I will take my corporal oath on it.— CERVANTES — Don Quixote. Pt. I. Bk. IV. Ch. X. Ch. X.

And hast thou sworn on every slight pretence, Till perjuries are common as bad pence, While thousands, careless of the damning sin, Kiss the book's outside, who ne'er look'd within?— COWPER — Expostulation. L. 384.

They fix attention, heedless of your pain, With oaths like rivets forced into the brain; And e'en when sober truth prevails throughout, They swear it, till affirmance breeds a doubt.— COWPER — Conversation. L. 63.

Take not His name, who made thy mouth, in vain; It gets thee nothing, and hath no excuse. C.— HERBERT — Temple. Church Porch. St. 10.

And for the support of this declaration, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.— THOMAS JEFFERSON — Declaration of

Independence. . In lapidary inscriptions a man is not upon oath— SAM'L JOHNSON — Boswell's Life of

Johnson. 1775. Vows with so much passion, swears with so much grace, That 't is a kind of Heaven to be deluded by him.— NATHANIEL LEE — The Rival Queens; or, Alexander the Great. Act I. Sc. 1.

I take the official oath to-day with no mental reservations and with no purpose to construe the Constitution by any hypercritical rules.— ABRAHAM LINCOLN — First Inaugural

Address. March 4, 1861. You can have no oath registered in heaven destroy the Government; while I shall have to destroy the Government; while Ishall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend" it.— ABRAHAM LINCOLN — First Inaugural

Address. March 4, 1861. Ease would recant Vows made in pain, as violent and void.— MILTON — Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 96.

Let us embrace, and from this very moment Vow an eternal misery together.— THOMAS OTWAY — The Orphan. Act IV. Sc. 1

And then a whoreson jackanapes must take up for me up for swearing as if I borrowed mine swearing; as if I borrowed mine oaths of him and might not spend them at my pleasure my pleasure.— Shakespeare — Cymbeline. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 3.

Who first comes to this world below With drear November's fog and snow Should prize the Topaz' amber hue- Emblem of friends and lovers true.