If you have lived, take thankfully the past. Make, as you can, the sweet remembrance last.
John DrydenAnd nobler is a limited command, Given by the love of all your native land, Than a successive title, long and dark, Drawn from the mouldy rolls of Noah's Ark.
John DrydenHe was the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul. . . . He was naturally learn'd; he needed not the spectacles of books to read Nature; he looked inwards, and found her there. . . . He is many times flat, insipid; his comic wit degenerating in to clenches, his serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some occasion is presented to him.
John Dryden