That blessed mood,

In which the burden of the mystery,

In which the heavy and the weary weight

Of all this unintelligible world,

Is lightened.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey.

The sightless Milton, with his hair

Around his placid temples curled;

And Shakespeare at his side,—a freight,

If clay could think and mind were weight,

For him who bore the world!

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): The Italian Itinerant.

Now cheaply bought for thrice their weight in gold.

John Ferriar (1764-1815): Illustrations of Sterne. Bibliomania. Line 65.

Wearing all that weight

Of learning lightly like a flower.

Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892): In Memoriam. Conclusion. Stanza 10.

With grave

Aspect he rose, and in his rising seem'd

A pillar of state; deep on his front engraven

Deliberation sat, and public care;

And princely counsel in his face yet shone,

Majestic though in ruin: sage he stood,

With Atlantean shoulders, fit to bear

The weight of mightiest monarchies; his look

Drew audience and attention still as night

Or summer's noontide air.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 300.

The monumental pomp of age

Was with this goodly personage;

A stature undepressed in size,

Unbent, which rather seemed to rise

In open victory o'er the weight

Of seventy years, to loftier height.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto iii.

The heart bowed down by weight of woe

To weakest hope will cling.

Alfred Bunn (1790-1860): Song.

Not two strong men the enormous weight could raise,—

Such men as live in these degenerate days.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): The Iliad of Homer. Book v. Line 371.