Careful Words

pine (n.)

pine (v.)

pine (adj.)

Dwindle, peak, and pine.

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

When stars are in the quiet skies,

Then most I pine for thee;

Bend on me then thy tender eyes,

As stars look on the sea.

Edward Bulwer Lytton (1805-1873): When Stars are in the quiet Skies.

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.

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.

O Love! what hours were thine and mine,

In lands of palm and southern pine;

In lands of palm, of orange-blossom,

Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine!

Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892): The Daisy. Stanza 1.

His spear, to equal which the tallest pine

Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the mast

Of some great ammiral were but a wand,

He walk'd with to support uneasy steps

Over the burning marle.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book i. Line 292.

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.

  He is the very pine-apple of politeness!

Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816): The Rivals. Act iii. Sc. 3.