He that holds fast the golden mean,

And lives contentedly between

The little and the great,

Feels not the wants that pinch the poor,

Nor plagues that haunt the rich man's door.

William Cowper (1731-1800): Translation of Horace. Book ii. Ode x.

Vessels large may venture more,

But little boats should keep near shore.

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

Alas! how little can a moment show

Of an eye where feeling plays

In ten thousand dewy rays:

A face o'er which a thousand shadows go!

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): The Triad.

Contented wi' little, and cantie wi' mair.

Robert Burns (1759-1796): Contented wi' Little.

Little deeds of kindness, little words of love,

Help to make earth happy like the heaven above.

Julia A Fletcher Carney: Little Things, 1845.

Little drops of water, little grains of sand,

Make the mighty ocean and the pleasant land.

So the little minutes, humble though they be,

Make the mighty ages of eternity.

Julia A Fletcher Carney: Little Things, 1845.

An old man, broken with the storms of state,

Is come to lay his weary bones among ye:

Give him a little earth for charity!

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

How great a matter a little fire kindleth!

New Testament: James iii. 5.

Did you ever hear of Captain Wattle?

He was all for love, and a little for the bottle.

Charles Dibdin (1745-1814): Captain Wattle and Miss Roe.

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.

And my large kingdom for a little grave,

A little little grave, an obscure grave.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Richard II. Act iii. Sc. 3.

But, children, you should never let

Such angry passions rise;

Your little hands were never made

To tear each other's eyes.

Isaac Watts (1674-1748): Divine Songs. Song xvi.

Some have too much, yet still do crave;

I little have, and seek no more:

They are but poor, though much they have,

And I am rich with little store:

They poor, I rich; they beg, I give;

They lack, I have; they pine, I live.

Edward Dyer (Circa 1540-1607): MS. Rawl. 85, p. 17.

His studie was but litel on the Bible.

Geoffrey Chaucer (1328-1400): Canterbury Tales. Prologue. Line 440.

Between the acting of a dreadful thing

And the first motion, all the interim is

Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream:

The Genius and the mortal instruments

Are then in council; and the state of man,

Like to a little kingdom, suffers then

The nature of an insurrection.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Julius Caesar. Act ii. Sc. 1.

Full little knowest thou that hast not tride,

What hell it is in suing long to bide:

To loose good dayes, that might be better spent;

To wast long nights in pensive discontent;

To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow;

To feed on hope, to pine with feare and sorrow.

  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

To fret thy soule with crosses and with cares;

To eate thy heart through comfortlesse dispaires;

To fawne, to crowche, to waite, to ride, to ronne,

To spend, to give, to want, to be undonne.

Unhappie wight, borne to desastrous end,

That doth his life in so long tendance spend!

Edmund Spenser (1553-1599): Mother Hubberds Tale. Line 895.

A little learning is a dangerous thing;

Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:

There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,

And drinking largely sobers us again.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): Essay on Criticism. Part ii. Line 15.

Love me litle, love me long.

John Heywood (Circa 1565): Proverbes. Part ii. Chap. ii.

Love me little, love me long.

Christopher Marlowe (1565-1593): The Jew of Malta. Act iv.

You say to me-wards your affection's strong;

Pray love me little, so you love me long.

Robert Herrick (1591-1674): Love me Little, Love me Long.

There was a little man, and he had a little soul;

And he said, Little Soul, let us try, try, try!

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): Little Man and Little Soul.

Man wants but little, nor that little long.

Edward Young (1684-1765): Night Thoughts. Night iv. Line 118.

Man wants but little here below,

Nor wants that little long.

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774): The Hermit. Chap. viii. Stanza 8.

A little month.

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

To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little

More than a little is by much too much.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry IV. Part I. Act iii. Sc. 2.

A little more than kin, and less than kind.

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

Her father loved me; oft invited me;

Still question'd me the story of my life,

From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes,

That I have passed.

I ran it through, even from my boyish days,

To the very moment that he bade me tell it:

Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances,

Of moving accidents by flood and field,

Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach,

Of being taken by the insolent foe

And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence

And portance in my travels' history;

Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,

Rough quarries, rocks and hills whose heads touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak,—such was the process;

And of the Cannibals that each other eat,

The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads

Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear

Would Desdemona seriously incline.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Othello. Act i. Sc. 3.

This child is not mine as the first was;

I cannot sing it to rest;

I cannot lift it up fatherly,

And bless it upon my breast.

Yet it lies in my little one's cradle,

And sits in my little one's chair,

And the light of the heaven she's gone to

Transfigures its golden hair.

James Russell Lowell (1819-1891): The Changeling.

This child is not mine as the first was;

I cannot sing it to rest;

I cannot lift it up fatherly,

And bless it upon my breast.

Yet it lies in my little one's cradle,

And sits in my little one's chair,

And the light of the heaven she's gone to

Transfigures its golden hair.

James Russell Lowell (1819-1891): The Changeling.

And I oft have heard defended,—

Little said is soonest mended.

George Wither (1588-1667): The Shepherd's Hunting.

Her father loved me; oft invited me;

Still question'd me the story of my life,

From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes,

That I have passed.

I ran it through, even from my boyish days,

To the very moment that he bade me tell it:

Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances,

Of moving accidents by flood and field,

Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach,

Of being taken by the insolent foe

And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence

And portance in my travels' history;

Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,

Rough quarries, rocks and hills whose heads touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak,—such was the process;

And of the Cannibals that each other eat,

The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads

Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear

Would Desdemona seriously incline.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Othello. Act i. Sc. 3.

There was a little man, and he had a little soul;

And he said, Little Soul, let us try, try, try!

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): Little Man and Little Soul.

Who think too little, and who talk too much.

John Dryden (1631-1701): Absalom and Achitophel. Part i. Line 534.

These little things are great to little man.

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774): The Traveller. Line 42.

A little too wise, they say, do ne'er live long.

Thomas Middleton (1580-1627): The Phoenix. Act i. Sc. 1.

Thou slave, thou wretch, thou coward!

Thou little valiant, great in villany!

Thou ever strong upon the stronger side!

Thou Fortune's champion that dost never fight

But when her humorous ladyship is by

To teach thee safety.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King John. Act iii. Sc. 1.

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:

Little we see in Nature that is ours.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Miscellaneous Sonnets. Part i. xxxiii.

Who are a little wise the best fools be.

Dr John Donne (1573-1631): The Triple Fool.