Careful Words

help (n.)

help (v.)

O limed soul, that, struggling to be free,

Art more engag'd! Help, angels! Make assay!

Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel,

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act iii. Sc. 3.

  Is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and when he has reached ground encumbers him with help?

Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. ii. Chap. ii. 1755.

Something between a hindrance and a help.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Michael.

Must helpless man, in ignorance sedate,

Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?

Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): Vanity of Human Wishes. Line 345.

  God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

Old Testament: Psalm xlvi. 1.

Help me, Cassius, or I sink!

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

Who ran to help me when I fell,

And would some pretty story tell,

Or kiss the place to make it well?

My mother.

Jane Taylor (1783-1824): My Mother.

  Vain is the help of man.

Old Testament: Psalm lx. 11; cviii. 12.

  I would help others, out of a fellow-feeling.

Robert Burton (1576-1640): Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader.

What's gone and what's past help

Should be past grief.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Winter's Tale. Act iii. Sc. 2.

God helps them that help themselves.

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790): Maxims prefixed to Poor Richard's Almanac, 1757.

Help thyself, and God will help thee.

George Herbert (1593-1632): Jacula Prudentum.

  Help thyself, and God will help thee.

J De La Fontaine (1621-1695): Book vi. Fable 18.