A prison is a house of care,
A place where none can thrive,

A touchstone true to try a friend,
A grave for one alive;

Sometimes a place of right,

Sometimes a place of wrong,
Sometimes a place of rogues and thieves,
And honest men among.

Inscription on Edinburgh Tolbooth.

A prison heav'ns, I loath the hated name,
Famine's metropolis, the sink of shame,
A nauseous sepulchre, whose craving womb
Hourly inters poor mortals in its tomb;
By ev'ry plague and ev'ry ill possess'd,
Ev'n purgatory itself to thee's a jest;
Emblem of hell, nursery of vice,
Thou crawling university of lice:

Where wretches numberless to ease their pains,
With smoke and ale delude their pensive chains.
How shall I thee avoid? or with what spell
Dissolve th' enchantment of thy magic cell?
Ev'n Fox himself can't boast so many martyrs,
As yearly fall within thy wretched quarters.
Money I've none, and debts I cannot pay,
Unless my vermin will those debts defray.
Not scolding wife, nor inquisition's worse;
Thou 'rt ev'ry mischief cramm'd into one curse.
Tom Brown.

How like

A prison's to a grave! when dead, we are
With solemn pomp brought thither; and our heirs,
Masking their joy in false dissembled tears,
Weep o'er the hearse: but earth no sooner covers
The earth brought thither, but they turn away
With inward smiles, the dead no more remember'd:
So enter'd into a prison.

Massinger's Maid of Honour.

A prison is in all things like a grave,
Where we no better privileges have
Than dead men; nor so good. The soul once fled
Lives freer now, than when she was cloist'red
In walls of flesh; and though she organs want
To act her swift designs, yet all will grant
Her faculties more clear, now separate,
Than if the same conjunction, which of late
Did marry her to earth, had stood in force;
Incapable of death, or of divorce;
But an imprison'd mind, though living, dies,
And, at one time, feels two captivities :
A narrow dungeon which her body holds,
But narrower body, which herself enfolds.

Dr. King, Bishop Chichester.
They say this is the dwelling of distress,
The very mansion-house of misery!
To me, alas! it seems but just the same,
With that more spacious jail-the busy world!
Beller's Injured Innocence.
They enter'd-'t was a prison room
Of stern serenity and gloom.

Scott's Lady of the Lake A felon's cell

Thas like a fever that doth shake a man
From strength to weakness, I consume myself:
I know this company, their custom wild,
Hated, abhorr'd of good men; yet, like a child,
By reason's rule instructed how to know
Evil from good, I to the worser go.

Wilkins's Miseries of enforced Marriage.
What is a prodigal? faith, like a brush,
That wears himself, to flourish others' clothes;
And having worn his heart ev'n to the stump,
He's thrown away like a deformed lump:
O such am I! I have spent all the wealth
My ancestors did purchase; made others brave
In shape and riches, and myself a knave:
For tho' my wealth rais'd some to paint their door,
"Tis shut against me, saying, I am poor.

Wilkins's Miseries of enforced Marriage.

What will this come to? he commands us to
Provide, and give great gifts, and all out of
An empty coffer: nor will he know
His purse, or yield me this

To show him what a beggar his heart is,
Being of no power to make his wishes good;
His promises fly so beyond his state,
That what he speaks is all in debt; he owes for
every word.

He is so kind, that he pays interest for 't:
His lands put to their books.

Shaks. Timon of Athens.

That which made him gracious in your eyes,
And gilded over his imperfections,
Is wasted and consumed ev'n like ice,
Which by the vehemence of heat dissolves,
And glides to many rivers; so his wealth,
That felt a prodigal hand, hot in expense,
Melted within his gripe, and from his coffers
Ran like a violent stream to other men's.
Cook's Green's Tu quoque.

Liberality

In some circumstances may be allow'd;
As when it has no end but honesty;

With a respect of person, quantity,
Quality, time, and place: but this profuse,

Vain, injudicious spending makes him idiot;
And yet the best of liberality

Is to be liberal to ourselves: and thus
Your wisdom is most liberal, and knows
How fond a thing it is for discreet men
To purchase with the loss of their estate
The name of one poor virtue, liberality,
And that too, only from the mouth of beggars!
One of your judgment would not, I am sure,
Buy all the virtues at so dear a rate

Randolph's Muse's Looking-Glass.

The spring, the summer,
The chilling autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the 'maz'd world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which.
Shaks. Midsummer Night's Dream.

No 'scape of nature, no distemper'd day,
No common wind, no customed event,
But they will pluck away its natural cause,
And call them meteors, prodigies, and signs,
Abortives, presages, and tongues of heaven.
Shaks. King John.

Learn'd men oft greedily pursue
Things that are rather wonderful than true,
And, in their nicest speculations, choose

To make their own discoveries strange news,
And nat'ral hist'ry rather a gazette
Of rareties stupendous and far-fet;
Believe no truths are worthy to be known
That are not strongly vast and overgrown,
And strive to explicate appearances,
Not as they're probable, but as they please.
In vain endeavour nature to suborn,
And, for their pains, are justly paid with scorn

Bute

PROMISES.

His promises were, as he then was, mighty;
But his performance, as he now is, nothing.
Shaks. Henry VIII.
Divinest creature, bright Astrea's daughter,
How shall I honour thec for this success!
Thy promises are like Adonis's gardens,
That one day bloom'd, and fruitful were the next.
Shaks. Henry IV. Part I.

He lin'd himself with hope,

Eating the air on promise of supply,
Flattering himself with project of a power
Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts;

And so with great imagination,

Proper to madmen, led his powers to death,
And winking leap'd into destruction.

A promise may be broke;

Nay, start not at it-'T is an hourly practice;
The trader breaks it, yet is counted honest.
The courtier keeps it not-yet keeps his honour;
Husband and wife in marriage promise much,
Yet follow separate pleasure, and are-virtuous.
The churchmen promise too, but wisely they
To a long payment stretch the crafty bill,
And draw upon futurity.

Havard's King Charles I.

They promise I bow and am thankful;
They fail to perform - I ne'er fret.

Eliza Cook's Poems.

PROPOSAL.

Wooing thee, I found thee of more value

And 't is the very riches of thyself

That now I aim at.

I know not why

I love this youth; and I have heard you say Love's reason's without reason.

Full many a lady

Shaks.

Shaks.

Within the hearts of all men lie

These promises of wider bliss, Which blossom into hopes that cannot die, In sunny hours like this.

And thou, bright maid, believe me whilst I swear; No time, no change, no future flame shall move The well-placed basis of my lasting love.

Prior

James R. Lowell's Poems. When wicked men make promises of truth, "Tis weakness to believe 'em.

Too much, Alexis, I have heard
But you shall promise, ne'er again
To breathe your vows, or speak your pain

Havard's Scanderbeg.

Prer.