Poetrie: "Life"

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A compilation of lines from various poets. Mrs. H.A. Deming spent a year assembling lines from 38 English and American poets into this mosaic verse, published in Current Opinion in 1893:

“Life”

Why all this toil for triumphs of an hour? (Young)
Life’s a short summer–man is but a flower. (Dr. Johnson)
By turns we catch the fatal breath and die; (Pope)
The cradle and the tomb, alas! how nigh. (Prior)
To be better far than not to be, (Sewell)
Though all man’s life may seem a tragedy; (Spencer)
But light cares speak when mighty griefs are dumb– (Daniel)
The bottom is but shallow whence they come. (Sir Walter Raleigh)
Thy fate is the common fate of all; (Longfellow)
Unmingled joys here no man befall; (Southwell)
Nature to each allots his proper sphere, (Congreve)
Fortune makes folly her peculiar care. (Churchill)
Custom does often reason overrule, (Rochester)
And throw a cruel sunshine on a fool. (Armstrong)
Live well; how long or short permit to Heaven. (Milton)
They who forgive most shall be most forgiven. (Bailey)
Sin may be clasped so close we cannot see its face– (French)
Vile intercourse where virtue has no place; (Somerville)
Then keep each passion down, however dear, (Thompson)
Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear. (Byron)
Her sensual snares let faithless pleasure lay, (Smollett)
With craft and skill to ruin and betray; (Crabbe)
Soar not too high to fall, but stoop to rise; (Massinger)
We masters grow of all that we despise. (Crowley)
Oh, then, renounce that impious self-esteem. (Beattie)
Riches have wings and grandeur is a dream. (Cowper)
Think not ambition wise because ’tis brave, (Sir William Davenant)
The paths of glory lead but to the grave; (Gray)
What is ambition? ‘Tis a glorious cheat, (Wills)
Only destructive to the brave and great. (Addison)
What’s all the gaudy glitter of a crown? (Dryden)
The way to bliss lies not on beds of down. (Francis Quarles)
How long we live, not years, but actions tell; (Watkins)
That man lives twice who lives the first life well. (Herrick)
Make, then, while yet ye may, your God your friend, (William Mason)
Whom Christians worship, yet not comprehend. (Hill)
The trust that’s given guard, and to yourself be just, (Dana)
For live we how we may, yet die we must. (Shakespeare)

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