'Tis thus the spirit of a single mind
Makes that of multitudes take one direction.
Don Juan. LORD BYRON.
For just experience tells, in every soil,
That those that think must govern those that toil.
The Traveller. O. GOLDSMITH.
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule.
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket!
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Some of their chiefs were princes of the land;
In the first rank of these did Zimri[A] stand;
A man so various, that he seemed to be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome:
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong;
Was everything by starts, and nothing long;
But, in the course of one revolving moon.
Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon;
Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking,
Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.
Absalom and Achitophel, Pt. I. J. DRYDEN.
[Footnote A: George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham.]
For close designs and crooked councils fit;
Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit;
Restless, unfixed in principles and place;
In power unpleased, impatient of disgrace:
A fiery soul, which, working out its way,
Fretted the pygmy-body to decay,
And o'er informed the tenement of clay.
A daring pilot in extremity;
Pleased with the danger, when the waves went high
He sought the storms; but for a calm unfit,
Would steer too nigh the sands to boast his wit.
Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide.
Absalom and Achitophel, Pt. I. (Earl of Shaftesbury.)
J. DRYDEN.
STEALING.
I'll example you with thievery:
The sun's a thief, and with his great attraction
Robs the vast sea: the moon's an arrant thief,
And her pale fire she snatches from the sun:
The sea's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves
The moon into salt tears: the earth's a thief,
That feeds and breeds by composture stolen
From general excrement: each thing's a thief.
Timon of Athens, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Kill a man's family and he may brook it,
But keep your hands out of his breeches' pocket.
Don Juan, Canto X. LORD BYRON.
Stolen sweets are always sweeter:
Stolen kisses much completer;
Stolen looks are nice in chapels:
Stolen, stolen be your apples.
Song of Fairies. T. RANDOLPH.