DOUBT.
Modest doubt is called
The beacon of the wise.
Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Who never doubted, never half believed,
Where doubt there truth is—'tis her shadow.
Festus: Sc. A Country Town. P.J. BAILEY.
Uncertain ways unsafest are,
And doubt a greater mischief than despair.
Cooper's Hill. SIR J. DENHAM.
But the gods are dead—
Ay, Zeus is dead, and all the gods but Doubt,
And Doubt is brother devil to Despair!
Prometheus: Christ. J.B. O'REILLY.
Our doubts are traitors
And make us lose the good we oft might win
By fearing to attempt.
Measure for Measure, Act i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
But now, I am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears.
Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;
Nothing's so hard but search will find it out.
Seek and Find. R. HERRICK.
Dubious is such a scrupulous good man—
Yes—you may catch him tripping if you can,
He would not, with a peremptory tone,
Assert the nose upon his face his own;
With hesitation admirably slow,
He humbly hopes—presumes—it may be so.
Conversation. W. COWPER.
But there are wanderers o'er Eternity
Whose bark drives on and on, and anchored ne'er shall be.
Childe Harold, Canto III. LORD BYRON.
The wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure; but modest doubt is called
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
To the bottom of the worst.
Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.