The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope: In Four Volumes. Collated with the Best Editions:

Front Cover
Printed at the Stanhope Press, by Charles Whittingham, ... for J. Sharpe; and sold by W. Suttaby, 1808

From inside the book

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 71 - Let not this weak, unknowing hand Presume thy bolts to throw, And deal damnation round the land On each I judge thy foe. If I am right, thy grace impart, Still in the right to stay; If I am wrong, oh, teach my heart To find that better way!
Page 36 - Great in the earth as in the ethereal frame, Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees : Lives through all life, extends through all extent, Spreads undivided, operates unspent ; Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart ; As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns, As the rapt Seraph that adores and burns ; To him no high, no low, no great, no small : He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all.
Page 13 - Tis not enough no harshness gives offence, The sound must seem an echo to the sense. Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows ; But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar...
Page 8 - A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again.
Page 68 - Soft yielding minds to water glide away, And sip, with nymphs, their elemental tea. The graver prude sinks downward to a gnome, In search of mischief still on earth to roam. The light coquettes in sylphs aloft repair, 65 And sport and flutter in the fields of air.
Page 30 - Hope humbly then ; with trembling pinions soar, Wait the great teacher, Death ; and God adore. What future bliss, he gives not thee to know, But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. 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.
Page 75 - At every word a reputation dies. Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that. Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day, The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray; The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, And wretches hang that jury-men may dine; The merchant from th' Exchange returns in peace, And the long labours of the toilet cease.
Page 70 - And decks the goddess with the glittering spoil. This casket India's glowing gems unlocks, And all Arabia breathes from yonder box. The tortoise here and elephant unite, Transform'd to combs — the speckled, and the white.
Page 111 - His gardens next your admiration call, On every side you look, behold the wall! No pleasing intricacies intervene, No artful wildness to perplex the scene; Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother, And half the platform just reflects the other.
Page 46 - And hell's grim tyrant feel the eternal wound. As the good shepherd tends his fleecy care,' Seeks freshest pasture and the purest air, Explores the lost, the wandering sheep directs, By day o'ersees them, and by night protects; The tender lambs he raises in his arms, Feeds from his hand, and in his bosom warms; Thus shall mankind his guardian care engage, The promised father of the future age.

Bibliographic information