George Herbert

Quotes

1. By no means run in debt: take thine own measure.

   Who cannot live on twenty pound a year,

   Cannot on forty.

2. 

   Let all the world in ev'ry corner sing,

   My God and King.

3. 

   Who says that fictions only and false hair

   Become a verse? Is there in truth no beauty?

   Is all good structure in a winding stair?

4. 

   Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,

   A box where sweets compacted lie.

5. 

   The worst speak something good; if all want sense,

   God takes a text, and preacheth Pa-ti-ence.

6. 

   Dare to be true. Nothing can need a lie:

   A fault, which needs it most, grows two thereby.

7. 

   My tender age in sorrow did begin:

   And still with sicknesses and shame

   Thou didst so punish sin,

   That I became

   Most thin.

   With thee

   Let me combine,

   And feel this day thy victory:

   For, If I imp my wing on thine,

   Affliction shall advance the flight in me

8. 

   Only a sweet and virtuous soul,

   Like season'd timber, never gives;

   But though the whole world turn to coal,

   Then chiefly lives.

9. 

   Wouldst thou both eat thy cake and have it?

10. 

    Chase brave employment with a naked sword

    Throughout the world.

11. 

    To write a verse or two is all the praise

    That I can raise.

12. 

    A broken ALTAR, Lord, thy servant rears,

    Made of a heart, and cemented with tears;

    Whose parts are as thy hand did frame;

    No workman's tool hath touch'd the same.

    A HEART alone

    Is such a stone

    As nothing but

    Thy pow'r doth cut.

    Wherefore each part

    Of my hard heart

    Meets in this frame,

    To praise thy name.

    That if I chance to hold my peace,

    These stones to praise thee may not cease.

    O let thy blessed SACRIFICE be mine,

    And sanctify this ALTAR to be thine.