You prove but too clearly that seeking to know Is too frequently learning to doubt.

Sure there are poets which did never dream Upon Parnassus, nor did taste the stream Of Helicon; we therefore may suppose Those made not poets, but the poets those.

Though with those streams he no resemblance hold, Whose foam is amber and their gravel gold; His genuine and less guilty wealth t' explore, Search not his bottom, but survey his shore.

Nor ought a genius less than his that writ attempt translation.

We are never like angels till our passion dies.

Tis the most certain sign, the world's accurst That the best things corrupted, are the worst; 'Twas the corrupted Light of knowledge, hurl'd Sin, Death, and Ignorance o'er all the world; That Sun like this (from which our sight we have) Gaz'd on too long, resumes the light he gave.

Uncertain ways unsafest are, and doubt a greater mischief than despair.