1. Quotes
  2. Authors
  3. Joseph Addison

Joseph Addison Quotes
page 5

Joseph Addison was an English essayist, poet, playwright and politician. He was the eldest son of The Reverend Lancelot Addison. His name is usually remembered alongside that of his long-standing friend Richard Steele, with whom he founded The Spectator magazine. Wikipedia  

✵ 1. May 1672 – 17. June 1719
Joseph Addison photo
Joseph Addison: 226 quotes40 likes

Joseph Addison Quotes

“How beautiful is death, when earn'd by virtue!
Who would not be that youth? What pity is it
That we can die but once to serve our country!”

Joseph Addison book Cato

Act IV, scene iv
Cato, A Tragedy (1713)

“See they suffer death,
But in their deaths remember they are men,
Strain not the laws to make their tortures grievous.”

Joseph Addison book Cato

Act III, scene v
Cato, A Tragedy (1713)

“The man resolved, and steady to his trust,
Inflexible to ill, and obstinately just,
May the rude rabble's insolence despise,
Their senseless clamours and tumultuous cries;
The tyrant's fierceness he beguiles,
And the stern brow, and the harsh voice defies,
And with superior greatness smiles.”

Joseph Addison

Translation of Horace, Odes, Book III, ode iii

“Let echo, too, perform her part,
Prolonging every note with art;
And in a low expiring strain,
Play all the concert o'er again.”

Joseph Addison

Ode for St. Cecilia's Day (1699), st. 4

“Music religious heat inspires,
It wakes the soul, and lifts it high,
And wings it with sublime desires,
And fits it to bespeak the Deity.”

Joseph Addison

Song for St. Cecilia's Day (1692), st. 4