But wild Ambition loves to slide, not stand,

And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land.

John Dryden (1631-1701): Absalom and Achitophel. Part i. Line 198.

As soon

Seek roses in December, ice in June;

Hope constancy in wind, or corn in chaff;

Believe a woman or an epitaph,

Or any other thing that's false, before

You trust in critics.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. Line 75.

Yon foaming flood seems motionless as ice;

Its dizzy turbulence eludes the eye,

Frozen by distance.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Address to Kilchurn Castle.

A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog

Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old,

Where armies whole have sunk: the parching air

Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire.

Thither by harpy-footed Furies hal'd,

At certain revolutions all the damn'd

Are brought, and feel by turns the bitter change

Of fierce extremes,—extremes by change more fierce;

From beds of raging fire to starve in ice

Their soft ethereal warmth, and there to pine

Immovable, infix'd, and frozen round,

Periods of time; thence hurried back to fire.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 592.

Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;

To lie in cold obstruction and to rot;

This sensible warm motion to become

A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit

To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside

In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice;

To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,

And blown with restless violence round about

The pendent world.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Measure for Measure. Act iii. Sc. 1.

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,

To throw a perfume on the violet,

To smooth the ice, or add another hue

Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light

To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,

Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King John. Act iv. Sc. 2.