C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

Rain

The kind refresher of the summer heats.

Thomson.

And now the thickened sky like a dark ceiling stood; down rushed the rain impetuous.

Milton.

For the rain it raineth every day.

Shakespeare.

Clouds dissolved the thirsty ground supply.

Roscommon.

The rain comes when the wind calls.

Emerson.

The hooded clouds, like friars, tell their beads in drops of rain.

Longfellow.

Nature, like man, sometimes weeps for gladness.

Beaconsfield.

A little rain will fill the lily’s cup, which hardly moists the field.

Edwin Arnold.

Foul with stains of gushing torrents and descending rains.

Addison.

The spongy clouds are filled with gathering rain.

Dryden.

I know Sir John will go, though he was sure it would rain cats and dogs.

Swift.

The day is dark and cold and dreary; it rains, and the wind is never weary.

Longfellow.

He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers that water the earth.

Bible.

Like a river down the gutter roars the rain, the welcome rain!

Longfellow.

Vexed sailors curse the rain for which poor shepherds prayed in vain.

Waller.

When the splitting wind makes flexible the knees of knotted oaks.

Shakespeare.

The mighty Rain
Holds the vast empire of the sky alone.

William Cullen Bryant.

Prelusive drops, let all their moisture flow in large effusion o’er the freshened world.

Thomson.

If there be one righteous person, the rain falls for his sake.

Buddha.

O earth! I will befriend thee more with rain than youthful April shall with all his showers; in summer’s drought I’ll drop upon thee still.

Shakespeare.

The rain-drops’ showery dance and rhythmic beat,
With tinkling of innumerable feet.

Abraham Coles.

He first that useful secret did explain,
That pricking corns foretold the gathering rain.

Gay.

All nature mourns, the skies relent in showers; hushed are the birds, and closed the drooping flowers.

Pope.

See daily show’rs rejoice the thirsty earth
And bless the flow’ry buds’ succeeding birth.

Prior.

Remember that every drop of rain that falls bears into the bosom of the earth a quality of beautiful fertility.

G. H. Lewes.

I think rain is as necessary to the mind as to vegetation. My very thoughts become thirsty, and crave the moisture.

John Burroughs.

The clouds consign their treasures to the fields, and, softly shaking on the dimpled pool prelusive drops, let all their moisture flow in large effusion o’er the freshening world.

Thomson.

The rain is playing its soft pleasant tune fitfully on the skylight, and the shade of the fast-flying clouds across my book passed with delicate change.

N. P. Willis.

I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.

Shelley.

Drip, drip, the rain comes falling,
Rain in the woods, rain on the sea;
Even the little waves, beaten, come crawling
As if to find shelter here with me.

James Herbert Morse.

All day the rain bathed the dark hyacinths in vain; the flood may pour from morn till night, nor wash the pretty Indian white.

Hafiz.

Dashing in big drops on the narrow pane,
And making mournful music for the mind,
While plays his interlude the wizzard wind,
I hear the singing of the frequent rain.

William H. Burleigh.

The later rain,—it falls in anxious haste
Upon the sun-dried fields and branches bare,
Loosening with searching drops the rigid waste,
As if it would each root’s lost strength repair.

Jones.

We knew it would rain, for the poplars showed
The white of their leaves, the amber grain
Shrunk in the wind,—and the lightning now
Is tangled in tremulous skeins of rain.

T. B. Aldrich.

Be still, sad heart, and cease repining;
Behind the clouds the sun is shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.

Longfellow.

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary,
It rains, and the wind is never weary;
The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,
But at every gust the dead leaves fall,
And the day is dark and dreary.

Longfellow.

When the black’ng clouds in sprinkling showers
Distil, from the high summits down the rain
Runs trickling, with the fertile moisture cheer’d,
The orchards smile, joyous the farmers see
Their thriving plants, and bless the heavenly dew.

Philips.

How it pours, pours, pours,
In a never-ending sheet!
How it drives beneath the doors!
How it soaks the passer’s feet!
How it rattles on the shutter!
How it rumples up the lawn!
How ’twill sigh, and moan, and mutter,
From darkness until dawn.

Rossiter Johnson.

’Twas so; I saw thy birth. That drowsy lake
From her faint bosom breath’d thee, the disease
Of her sick waters, and infectious ease.
But now at even,
Too gross for heaven,
Thou fall’st in tears, and weep’st for thy mistake.

Henry Vaughan.

Last night, above the whistling wind,
I heard the welcome rain,—
A fusillade upon the roof,
A tattoo on the pane:
The keyhole piped; the chimney-top
A warlike trumpet blew.

Bret Harte.

The rain is o’er—How densely bright
Yon pearly clouds reposing lie!
Cloud above cloud, a glorious sight,
Contrasting with the deep-blue sky!
In grateful silence earth receives
The general blessing; fresh and fair
Each flower expands its little leaves,
As glad the common joy to share.

Andrew Norton.

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