While timorous wit goes round, or fords the shore,
He shoots the gulf, and is already o'er,
And, when the enthusiastic fit is spent,
Looks back amazed at what he underwent."[65]
Pithy sentences and phrases always drop from Dryden's pen as if unawares,
whether in prose or verse. I string together a few at random:--
"The greatest argument for love is love."
"Few know the use of life before 't is past."
"Time gives himself and is not valued."
"Death in itself is nothing; but we fear
To be we know not what, we know not where."
"Love either finds equality or makes it;
Like death, he knows no difference in degrees."
"That's empire, that which I can give away."
"Yours is a soul irregularly great,
Which, wanting temper, yet abounds in heat."
"Forgiveness to the injured does belong,
But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong."
"Poor women's thoughts are all extempore."
"The cause of love can never be assigned,
'T is in no face, but in the lover's mind."[66]
"Heaven can forgive a crime to penitence,
For Heaven can judge if penitence be true;
But man, who knows not hearts, should make examples."
"Kings' titles commonly begin by force,
Which time wears off and mellows into right.
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