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.

The rainbow comes and goes,

And lovely is the rose.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Ode. Intimations of Immortality. Stanza 2.

There was an awful rainbow once in heaven:

We know her woof, her texture; she is given

In the dull catalogue of common things.

Philosophy will clip an angel's wings.

John Keats (1795-1821): Lamia. Part ii.

Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life,

The evening beam that smiles the clouds away,

And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray!

Lord Byron 1788-1824: The Bride of Abydos. Canto ii. Stanza 20.