Thomas Hood

But who would rush at a benighted man, and give him two black eyes for being blind?

— Thomas Hood

My books kept me from the ring, the dog-pit, the tavern, and the saloon.

— Thomas Hood

A certain portion of the human race has certainly a taste for being diddled.

— Thomas Hood

But evil is wrought by want of thought as well as want of heart!

— Thomas Hood

Gold! Gold! Gold! Bright and yellow, hard and cold.

— Thomas Hood

Oh, God! that bread should be so dear! And flesh and blood so cheap!

— Thomas Hood

Good-morrow to the golden Morning! Good-morrow to the world's delight! I've come to bless thy life's beginning, That hath made my own so bright!

— Thomas Hood

What different dooms our birthdays bring!

— Thomas Hood

So mayst thou live, dear! many years, In all the bliss that life endears, Not without smiles, nor yet from tears Too strictly kept: When first thy infant littleness I folded in my fond caress, The greatest proof of happiness Was this--I wept.

— Thomas Hood

Sure, of all days that ever were dated, Valentine's Day is the fullest of news; Then ev'ry lass expects to be mated And Cupid goes round collecting his dues! And levies a door-rate, like parish or poor-rate, By getting the Postman to stand in his shoes.

— Thomas Hood

And ye, who have met with Adversity's blast, And been bow'd to the earth by its fury; To whom the Twelve Months, that have recently pass'd, Were as harsh as a prejudiced jury,--Still, fill to the Future! and join in our chime, The regrets of remembrance to cozen, And having obtained a New Trial of Time, Shout in hopes of a kindlier dozen!

— Thomas Hood

The Spring! I shrink and shudder at her name! For why, I find her breath a bitter blighter! And suffer from her blows as if they came From Spring the Fighter.

— Thomas Hood

Some sigh for this and that, My wishes don't go far, The world may wag at will, So I have my cigar.

— Thomas Hood

See drinkers of water, their wits never lacking, Direct as a railroad and smooth in their gaits; But look at the bibbers of wine, they go tacking, Like ships that have met a foul wind in the straights.

— Thomas Hood

Gin! Gin! a Drop of Gin! Oh! then its tremendous temptations begin, To take, alas! To the fatal glass,--And happy the wretch that it does not win To change the black hue Of his ruin to blue--While Angels sorrow, and Demons grin--And lose the rheumatic Chill of his attic By plunging into the Palace of Gin!

— Thomas Hood

Now to christen the infant Kilmansegg, For days and days it was quite a plague, To hunt the list in the Lexicon: And scores were tried like coin by the ring, Ere names were found just the proper thing For a minor rich as a Mexican.

— Thomas Hood

To justify the festive cup What horrors here are conjured up! What things of bitter bite and sup, Poor wretched Twenty-One's! No landed lumps, but frumps and humps, (Discretion's Days are far from trumps) Domestic discord, dowdies, dumps, Death, dockets, debts, and duns!

— Thomas Hood

Said Nestor, to his pretty wife, quite sorrowful one day, "Why, dearest, will you shed in pearls those lovely eyes away? You ought to be more fortified;" "Ah, brute, be quiet, do, I know I'm not so fortyfied, nor fiftyfied, as you!"

— Thomas Hood