Percy Bysshe Shelley

“You would not easily guess All the modes of distress Which torture the tenants of earth; And the various evils, Which like so many devils, Attend the poor souls from their birth.”

“Cease, cease, wayward Mortal! I dare not unveil The shadows that float o'er Eternity's vale; Nought waits for the good but a spirit of Love, That will hail their blest advent to regions above. For Love, Mortal, gleams through the gloom of my sway, And the shades which surround me fly fast at its ray.”

“Dar'st thou amid the varied multitude To live alone, an isolated thing?”

“Not the swart Pariah in some Indian grove, Lone, lean, and hunted by his brother's hate, Hath drunk so deep the cup of bitter fate As that poor wretch who cannot, cannot love: He bears a load which nothing can remove, A killing, withering weight.”

“Sweet the rose which lives in Heaven, Although on earth ’tis planted, Where its honours blow, While by earth’s slaves the leaves are riven Which die the while they glow.”

“Age cannot Love destroy, But perfidy can blast the flower, Even when in most unwary hour It blooms in Fancy's bower. Age cannot Love destroy, But perfidy can rend the shrine In which its vermeil splendours shine.”

“I think that the leaf of a tree, the meanest insect we trample are in themselves arguments more conclusive than any which can be adduced that some vast intellect animates Infinity.”

“Once, early in the morning, Beelzebub arose, With care his sweet person adorning, He put on his Sunday clothes.”

“Twilight, ascending slowly from the east, Entwined in duskier wreaths her braided locks O'er the fair front and radiant eyes of day, Night followed, clad with stars.”

“The lone couch of his everlasting sleep.”

“Some say that gleams of a remoter world Visit the soul in sleep, — that death is slumber, And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber Of those who wake and live.”

“We rest. — A dream has power to poison sleep; We rise. — One wandering thought pollutes the day; We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or weep; Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away: It is the same! — For, be it joy or sorrow, The path of its departure still is free: Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow; Nought may endure but Mutability.”

“Yet now despair itself is mild, Even as the winds and waters are; I could lie down like a tired child, And weep away the life of care Which I have borne and yet must bear, Till death like sleep might steal on me, And I might feel in the warm air My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.”

“Sun-girt City, thou hast been Ocean's child, and then his queen; Now is come a darker day, And thou soon must be his prey.”

“Chameleons feed on light and air: Poets' food is love and fame.”

“Men of England, wherefore plough For the lords who lay ye low?”

“The seed ye sow another reaps; The wealth ye find another keeps; The robes ye weave another wears; The arms ye forge another bears.”

“Nothing in the world is single, All things by a law divine In one spirit meet and mingle — Why not I with thine?”

“The sunlight clasps the earth, And the moonbeams kiss the sea: What are all these kissings worth If thou kiss not me?”

“I arise from dreams of thee In the first sweet sleep of night, When the winds are breathing low, And the stars are shining bright.”

“O lift me from the grass! I die! I faint! I fail! Let thy love in kisses rain On my lips and eyelids pale. My cheek is cold and white, alas! My heart beats loud and fast: O press it to thine own again, Where it will break at last!”

“Hell is a city much like London — A populous and smoky city.”

“Teas, Where small talk dies in agonies.”

“Peter was dull; he was at first Dull,—oh so dull, so very dull! Whether he talked, wrote, or rehearsed, Still with this dulness was he cursed! Dull,—beyond all conception, dull.”

“I have drunken deep of joy, And I will taste no other wine tonight.”

“Good-night? ah! no; the hour is ill Which severs those it should unite; Let us remain together still, Then it will be good night.”

“The breath Of accusation kills an innocent name, And leaves for lame acquittal the poor life, Which is a mask without it.”

“An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king, — Princes, the dregs of their dull race, who flow Through public scorn, — mud from a muddy spring, — Rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor know, But leech-like to their fainting country cling, Till they drop, blind in blood, without a blow.”

“A lovely lady, garmented in light From her own beauty.”

“First our pleasures die — and then Our hopes, and then our fears — and when These are dead, the debt is due, Dust claims dust — and we die too.”