Quotes
Quotes about Rest
O fairest flower! no sooner blown but blasted,
Soft silken primrose fading timelessly.
Thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.
The fairest garden in her looks,
And in her mind the wisest books.
Our souls sit close and silently within,
And their own web from their own entrails spin;
And when eyes meet far off, our sense is such,
That, spider-like, we feel the tenderest touch.
Nor can his blessed soul look down from heaven,
Or break the eternal sabbath of his rest.
Flowery oratory he despised. He ascribed to the interested views of themselves or their relatives the declarations of pretended patriots, of whom he said, "All those men have their price."
Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep!
Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never is, but always to be blest.
The soul, uneasy and confined from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
In lazy apathy let stoics boast
Their virtue fix'd: 't is fix'd as in a frost;
Contracted all, retiring to the breast;
But strength of mind is exercise, not rest.
And hence one master-passion in the breast,
Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest.
Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow;
The rest is all but leather or prunello.
To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite,
Who never mentions hell to ears polite.
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And without sneering teach the rest to sneer;
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike.
Religion blushing, veils her sacred fires,
And unawares Morality expires.
Nor public flame nor private dares to shine;
Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine!
Lo! thy dread empire Chaos is restor'd,
Light dies before thy uncreating word;
Thy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtain fall,
And universal darkness buries all.
As full-blown poppies, overcharg'd with rain,
Decline the head, and drooping kiss the plain,--
So sinks the youth; his beauteous head, deprest
Beneath his helmet, drops upon his breast.
The rest were vulgar deaths, unknown to fame.
Dispel this cloud, the light of Heaven restore;
Give me to see, and Ajax asks no more.
To heal divisions, to relieve th' opprest;
In virtue rich; in blessing others, blest.
True friendship's laws are by this rule exprest,--
Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest.
For too much rest itself becomes a pain.
And rest at last where souls unbodied dwell,
In ever-flowing meads of Asphodel.
Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears
Her snaky crest.
A pleasing land of drowsyhed it was,
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye;
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,
Forever flushing round a summer sky:
There eke the soft delights that witchingly
Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast,
And the calm pleasures always hover'd nigh;
But whate'er smack'd of noyance or unrest
Was far, far off expell'd from this delicious nest.
The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the force of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the wind may blow through it; the storms may enter, the rain may enter,--but the King of England cannot enter; all his forces dare not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement!
Of all the griefs that harass the distrest,
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest.
