Embryos and idiots, eremites and friars,

White, black, and gray, with all their trumpery.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book iii. Line 474.

How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Macbeth. Act iv. Sc. 1.

Seems, madam! nay, it is; I know not "seems."

'T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother,

Nor customary suits of solemn black.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act i. Sc. 2.

Then black despair,

The shadow of a starless night, was thrown

Over the world in which I moved alone.

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822): The Revolt of Islam. Dedication. Stanza 6.

Every white will have its blacke,

And every sweet its soure.

Thomas Percy (1728-1811): Reliques of Ancient Poetry. Sir Cauline.

A Persian's heaven is eas'ly made:

'T is but black eyes and lemonade.

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): Intercepted Letters. Letter vi.

Hung be the heavens with black, yield day to night!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry VI. Part I. Act i. Sc. 1.

Black is a pearl in a woman's eye.

George Chapman (1557-1634): An Humorous Day's Mirth.

And finds, with keen, discriminating sight,

Black's not so black,—nor white so very white.

George Canning (1770-1827): New Morality.

The other shape,

If shape it might be call'd that shape had none

Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb;

Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd,

For each seem'd either,—black it stood as night,

Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell,

And shook a dreadful dart; what seem'd his head

The likeness of a kingly crown had on.

Satan was now at hand.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 666.

More black than ash-buds in the front of March.

Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892): The Gardener's Daughter.

For him was lever han at his beddes hed

A twenty bokes, clothed in black or red,

Of Aristotle, and his philosophie,

Than robes riche, or fidel, or sautrie.

But all be that he was a philosophre,

Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre.

Geoffrey Chaucer (1328-1400): Canterbury Tales. Prologue. Line 295.

Black spirits and white, red spirits and gray,

Mingle, mingle, mingle, you that mingle may.

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627): The Witch. Act v. Sc. 2.

The sun had long since in the lap

Of Thetis taken out his nap,

And, like a lobster boil'd, the morn

From black to red began to turn.

Samuel Butler (1600-1680): Hudibras. Part ii. Canto ii. Line 29.

White shall not neutralize the black, nor good

Compensate bad in man, absolve him so:

Life's business being just the terrible choice.

Robert Browning (1812-1890): The Ring and the Book. The Pope. Line 1236.

How pure the joy, when first my hands unfold

The small, rare volume, black with tarnished gold!

John Ferriar (1764-1815): Illustrations of Sterne. Bibliomania. Line 137.