English Romantic poet (1788-1824)
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall;
And when Rome falls--the World.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Dim with the mist of years, gray flits the shade of power.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
For most men (till by losing rendered sager)
Will back their own opinions by a wager.
LORD BYRON
Beppo
And history with all her volumes vast,
Hath but one page.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean--roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin--his control
Stops with the shore.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
I will have nothing to do with your immortality; we are miserable enough in this life, without the absurdity of speculating upon another.
LORD BYRON
letter to Francis Hodgson, September 3, 1811
Too oft is a smile
But the hypocrite's wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh,
Whilst the soul-telling eye
Is dimm'd, for a time, with a Tear.
LORD BYRON
"The Tear"
A thousand years scarce serve to form a state;
An hour may lay it in the dust.
LORD BYRON
Don Juan
Be hypocritical, be cautious, be
Not what you seem but always what you see.
LORD BYRON
Don Juan
Yet he was jealous, though he did not show it,
For jealousy dislikes the world to know it.
LORD BYRON
Don Juan
Her lips, whose kisses pout to leave their nest.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
'Tis sweet to listen as the night winds creep
From leaf to leaf.
LORD BYRON
"Sweet Things"
He who first met the Highlands' swelling blue
Will love each peak that shows a kindred hue,
Hail in each crag a friend's familiar face,
And clasp the mountain in his mind's embrace.
LORD BYRON
The Island
How beauteous are rouleaus! how charming chests
Containing ingots, bags of dollars, coins
(Not of old victors, all whose heads and crests
Weigh not the thin ore where their visage shines,
But) of fine unclipt gold, where dully rests
Some likeness, which the glittering cirque confines,
Of modern, reigning, sterling, stupid stamp;--
Yes! ready money is Aladdin's lamp.
LORD BYRON
Don Juan