Sir John Denham Quotes. S. Austin Allibone, comp. 1880. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay

S. Austin Allibone, comp. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. 1880.

Sir John Denham


There are certain garbs and modes of speaking which vary with the times; the fashion of our clothes being not more subject to alteration than that of our speech. Sir John Denham.	1

The three first parts I dedicate to my old friends, to take off those melancholy reflections which the sense of age, infirmity, and death may give them. Sir John Denham.	2

Scaliger, comparing the two orators, says that nothing can be taken from Demosthenes nor added to Tully. Sir John Denham.	3

If a heathen philosopher brings up arguments from reason, which none of our atheistical sophisters can confute, for the immortality of the soul, I hope they will so weigh the consequences as neither to talk nor live as if there was no such thing. Sir John Denham.	4

Whosoever offers at verbal translation shall have the misfortune of that young traveller who lost his own language abroad, and brought home no other instead of it. Sir John Denham.	5

Poetry is of so subtle a spirit that in the pouring out of one language into another it will all evaporate; and if a new spirit be not added in the transfusion there will remain nothing but a caput mortuum. Sir John Denham.	6

So few translations deserve praise, that I scarce ever saw any which deserved pardon. Sir John Denham.	7