Wheneer with haggard eyes I view This dungeon that Im rotting in, I think of those companions true Who studied with me at the U- Niversity of Göttingen. George CanningSong. Of One Eleven Years in Prison. Found in The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin. Also in Burlesque Plays and Poems, edited by Henry Morley.
That which the world miscalls a jail, A private closet is to me. * * * * * Locks, bars, and solitude together met, Make me no prisoner, but an anchoret. Attributed to Sir Roger LEstrange. Also to Lord Capel. Found in the New Foundling Hospital for Wit. (Ed. 1786). IV. 40, as a supplementary stanza. See Notes and Queries, April 10, 1909. P. 288.
Doubles grilles à gros cloux, Triples portes, forts verroux, Aux âmes vraiment méchantes Vous représentez lenfer: Mais aux âmes innocentes Vous netes que du bois, des pierres, du fer. Fast closed with double grills And triple gatesthe cell To wicked souls is hell; But to a mind thats innocent Tis only iron, wood and stone. PelissonWritten on the walls of his cell in the Bastile. (About 1661).
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass, Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron, Can be retentive to the strength of spirit; But life, being weary of these worldly bars, Never lacks power to dismiss itself. Julius Cæsar. Act I. Sc. 3. L. 93.
I have been studying how I may compare This prison where I live unto the world: And for because the world is populous And here is not a creature but myself, I cannot do it; yet Ill hammer it out. Richard II. Act V. Sc. 5. L. 1.