TRUTH.
Truth is the highest thing that man may keep.
The Frankeleines Tale. CHAUCER.
But truths on which depends our main concern,
That 't is our shame and misery not to learn,
Shine by the side of every path we tread
With such a lustre he that runs may read.
Tirocinium. W. COWPER.
For truth has such a face and such a mien,
As to be loved needs only to be seen.
The Hind and Panther. J. DRYDEN.
And simple truth miscalled simplicity,
And captive good attending captain ill.
Sonnet LXVI. SHAKESPEARE.
The firste vertue, gone, if thou wilt lere,
Is to restreine, and kepen wel thy tonge.
The Manciples Tale. CHAUCER.
'T is strange—but true; for truth is always strange:
Stranger than fiction.
Don Juan, Canto XIV. LORD BYRON.
But what is truth? 'T was Pilate's question put
To Truth itself, that deigned him no reply.
The. Task, Bk. III. W. COWPER.
The sages say, Dame Truth delights to dwell
(Strange mansion!) in the bottom of a well:
Questions are then the windlass and the rope
That pull the grave old Gentlewoman up,
Birthday Ode. J. WOLCOTT (Peter Pindar).
Get but the truth once uttered, and 't is like
A star new-born that drops into its place
And which, once circling in its placid round,
Not all the tumult of the earth can shake.
Glance Behind the Curtain. J.R. LOWELL.