Or, having sworn too hard a keeping oath,

Study to break it and not break my troth.

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

With many a stiff thwack, many a bang,

Hard crab-tree and old iron rang.

Samuel Butler (1600-1680): Hudibras. Part i. Canto ii. Line 831.

Long is the way

And hard, that out of hell leads up to light.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 432.

Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;

Nothing's so hard but search will find it out.

Robert Herrick (1591-1674): Seek and Find.

Each cursed his fate that thus their project crossed;

How hard their lot who neither won nor lost!

Richard Graves (1715-1804): The Festoon (1767).

Life! we 've been long together

Through pleasant and through cloudy weather;

'T is hard to part when friends are dear,—

Perhaps 't will cost a sigh, a tear;

Then steal away, give little warning,

Choose thine own time;

Say not "Good night," but in some brighter clime

Bid me "Good morning."

Mrs Barbauld (1743-1825): Life.

O woman! in our hours of ease

Uncertain, coy, and hard to please,

And variable as the shade

By the light quivering aspen made;

When pain and anguish wring the brow,

A ministering angel thou!

Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832): Marmion. Canto vi. Stanza 30.