Quotes from work

Retirement

“A business with an income at its heels
Furnishes always oil for its own wheels.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 615.

“Built God a church, and laugh'd his word to scorn.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 688.

“Philologists, who chase
A panting syllable through time and space,
Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark
To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah's ark.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 691.

“I praise the Frenchman [Voltaire], his remark was shrewd —
How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude!
But grant me still a friend in my retreat
Whom I may whisper — solitude is sweet.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 739.

“Absence of occupation is not rest,
A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 623.

“An idler is a watch that wants both hands;
As useless when it goes as when it stands.”

William Cowper Retirement

Source: Retirement (1782), Line 681.