“Act well your part; there all the honour lies.”

“An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie;for an excuse is a lie guarded”

“For he lives twice who can at once employ,The present well, and e’en the past enjoy.”

“If it be the chief point of friendship to comply with a friend's notions and inclinations he possesses this is an eminent degree; he lies down when I sit, and walks when I walk, which is more that many good friends can pretend to do.”

“Out with it, Dunciad: let the secret pass -That secret to each fool - that he's an ass.The truth once told (and whereby should we lie?),The queen of Midas slept, and so may I.You think this cruel? Take it for a rule,No creature smarts so little as a fool.”

“All Nature is but art, unknown to theeAll chance, direction, which thou canst not see;All discord, harmony not understood; All partial evil, universal good.”

“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,The proper study of mankind is Man.Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,A being darkly wise and rudely great:With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest;In doubt to deem himself a God or Beast;In doubt his mind or body to prefer;Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err;Alike in ignorance, his reason such,Whether he thinks too little or too much;Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;Still by himself abused or disabused;Created half to rise, and half to fall;Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd;The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!Go, wondrous creature! mount where science guides,Go, measure earth, weigh air, and state the tides;Instruct the planets in what orbs to run,Correct old time, and regulate the sun;Go, soar with Plato to th’ empyreal sphere,To the first good, first perfect, and first fair;Or tread the mazy round his followers trod,And quitting sense call imitating God;As Eastern priests in giddy circles run,And turn their heads to imitate the sun.Go, teach Eternal Wisdom how to rule—Then drop into thyself, and be a fool!”