John Dryden
Books and Quotes Collection
Annus Mirabilis
1667
And, while this fam'd Emporium we prepare, / The British Ocean shall such triumphs boast, / That those who now disdain our Trade to share, / Shall rob like Pyrats on our wealthy Coast.
Wit, […] the faculty of imagination in the writer, which searches over all the memory for the species or ideas of those things which it designs to represent.
Aeneid
1697
Heav'ns what a spring was in his Arm, to throw: /
How high he held his Shield, and rose at ev'ry blow!
My guilt thy growing virtues did defame; / My blackness blotted thy unblemish'd name.
The Heroe, looking on the left, espy'd /
A lofty Tow'r, and strong on ev'ry side / […]
Vain is the force of Man, and Heav'ns as van, /
To crush the Pillars which the Pile sustain. /
Sublime on these a Tow'r of Steel is rear'd; /
And dire Tisiphone these keeps the Ward.
Shall Turnus then such endless Toil sustain, /
In fighting Fields, and conquer Towns in vain:
His Sons, who seek the Tyrant to sustain, /
And long for Arbitrary Lords again,
Adoring first the Genius of the Place, / Then Earth, the Mother of the Heav'nly Race, / The Nymphs, and native Godheads yet unknown, / And Night, and all the Stars that gild her sable Throne,