A man may well bring a horse to the water,
But he cannot make him drinke without he will.
Much water goeth by the mill
That the miller knoweth not of.
Note 1.Altissima quæque flumina minimo sono labi (The deepest rivers flow with the least sound).--Q. Curtius, vii. 4. 13.
Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep.--William Shakespeare: 2 Henry VI. act iii. sc. i.
Where the streame runneth smoothest, the water is deepest.
Give me a spirit that on this life's rough sea
Loves t' have his sails fill'd with a lusty wind,
Even till his sail-yards tremble, his masts crack,
And his rapt ship run on her side so low
That she drinks water, and her keel plows air.
Words writ in waters.
To unpathed waters, undreamed shores.
Not all the water in the rough rude sea
Can wash the balm off from an anointed king.
She is mine own,
And I as rich in having such a jewel
As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl,
The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep.
Lord, Lord! methought, what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noise of waters in mine ears!
What ugly sights of death within mine eyes!
Methought I saw a thousand fearful wrecks,
Ten thousand men that fishes gnawed upon,
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels,
All scattered in the bottom of the sea:
Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in those holes
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept,
As 't were in scorn of eyes, reflecting gems.
Men's evil manners live in brass; their virtues
We write in water.
She is a woman, therefore may be woo'd;
She is a woman, therefore may be won;
She is Lavinia, therefore must be loved.
What, man! more water glideth by the mill
Than wots the miller of; and easy it is
Of a cut loaf to steal a shive.
Here's that which is too weak to be a sinner,--honest water, which ne'er left man i' the mire.
The earth hath bubbles as the water has,
And these are of them.
Let not women's weapons, water-drops,
Stain my man's cheeks!
The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,
Burn'd on the water; the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver,
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water which they beat to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
It beggar'd all description.
That which is now a horse, even with a thought
The rack dislimns, and makes it indistinct,
As water is in water.
Hark, hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,
And Phoebus 'gins arise,
His steeds to water at those springs
On chaliced flowers that lies;
And winking Mary-buds begin
To ope their golden eyes:
With everything that pretty is,
My lady sweet, arise.
Ships are but boards, sailors but men: there be land-rats and water-rats, water-thieves and land-thieves.
Who then to frail mortality shall trust
But limns on water, or but writes in dust.
Like the watermen that row one way and look another.
The miller sees not all the water that goes by his mill.
All your better deeds
Shall be in water writ, but this in marble.
These reasons made his mouth to water.