To sell a bargain well is as cunning as fast and loose.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Love's Labour's Lost. Act iii. Sc. 1.

Than catch and hold while I may, fast binde, fast finde.

John Heywood (Circa 1565): Proverbes. Part i. Chap. iii.

Mine be the breezy hill that skirts the down,

Where a green grassy turf is all I crave,

With here and there a violet bestrewn,

Fast by a brook or fountain's murmuring wave;

And many an evening sun shine sweetly on my grave!

James Beattie (1735-1803): The Minstrel. Book ii. Stanza 17.

Or if Sion hill

Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook, that flow'd

Fast by the oracle of God.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book i. Line 10.

I am thy father's spirit,

Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,

And for the day confin'd to fast in fires,

Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature

Are burnt and purg'd away. But that I am forbid

To tell the secrets of my prison-house,

I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word

Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,

Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,

Thy knotted and combined locks to part

And each particular hair to stand an end,

Like quills upon the fretful porpentine:

But this eternal blazon must not be

To ears of flesh and blood. List, list, O, list!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act i. Sc. 5.

Man's life is like unto a winter's day,—

Some break their fast and so depart away;

Others stay dinner, then depart full fed;

The longest age but sups and goes to bed.

O reader, then behold and see!

As we are now, so must you be.

Joseph Henshaw (1608-1679): Horae Sucissive (1631).

And join with thee calm Peace and Quiet,

Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet.

John Milton (1608-1674): Il Penseroso. Line 45.

Fast-anchor'd isle.

William Cowper (1731-1800): The Task. Book ii. The Timepiece. Line 151.

Oh why should the spirit of mortal be proud?

Like a fast-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,

A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,

He passes from life to his rest in the grave.

William Knox (1789-1825): Mortality.

Oh why should the spirit of mortal be proud?

Like a fast-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,

A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,

He passes from life to his rest in the grave.

William Knox (1789-1825): Mortality.