“Our wasted oil unprofitably burns,
Like hidden lamps in old sepulchral urns.”

— William Cowper

Source: Conversation (1782), Line 357.

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William Cowper 174

(1731–1800) English poet and hymnodist 1731–1800

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified

“WHEN father bought the lamp, or a little before that, he said to mother:
"Hark ye, mother—ought n't we to buy us a lamp?"
"A lamp? What sort of a lamp?"
"What! Don't you know that the storekeeper who lives in the market town has brought from St. Petersburg lamps that actually burn better than ten päreä? [1] They've already got a lamp of the sort at the parsonage."
"Oh, yes! Is n't it one of those things which shines in the middle of the room so that we can see to read in every corner, just as if it was broad daylight?"
"That's just it. There's oil that burns in it, and you only have to light it of an evening, and it burns on without going out till the next morning."
"But how can the wet oil burn?"”

Juhani Aho (1861–1921) Finnish author and journalist

"You might as well ask—how can brandy burn?"
Juhani Aho. " When Father Brought Home the Lamp https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Stories_by_Foreign_Authors_(Scandinavian)/When_Father_Brought_Home_the_Lamp," Translated by R. Nisbet Bain. in: Stories by Foreign Authors–Scandinavian, Cassell Publishing Co. 1898.

“Old Friends burn dim, like lamps in noisome air,
Love them for what they are; nor love them less,
Because to thee they are not what they were.”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher

Duty Surviving Self-Love (1826)
Context: O wiselier then, from feeble yearnings freed,
While, and on whom, thou may'st — shine on! nor heed
Whether the object by reflected light
Return thy radiance or absorb it quite:
And tho' thou notest from thy safe recess
Old Friends burn dim, like lamps in noisome air,
Love them for what they are; nor love them less,
Because to thee they are not what they were.