Twas he that ranged the words at random flung,
Pierced the fair pearls and them together strung. [ Firdousi ]

Never can true reconcilement grow,
Where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep. [ Milton ]

His words seem'd oracles
That pierced their bosoms; and each man would turn
And gaze in wonder on his neighbour's face,
That with the like dumb wonder answer'd him.
You could have heard
The beating of your pulses while he spoke. [ George Croly ]

There is a strength
Deep-bedded in our hearts, of which we reck
But little, till the shafts of heaven have pierced
Its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent
Before her gems are found? [ Mrs. Hemans ]

Remorse is as the heart in which it grows.
If that be gentle, it drops balmy dews
Of true repentance; but if proud and gloomy,
It is the poison tree that, pierced to the inmost,
Weeps only tears of poison. [ Coleridge ]

But words are words; I never yet did hear
That the bruised heart was pierced through the ear. [ William Shakespeare, Othello, Act I. Sc. 3 ]

Tears of joy, like summer rain-drops, are pierced by sunbeams. [ H. Ballou ]

Never did poesy appear so full of heaven to me as when I saw how it pierced through pride and fear to the lives of coarsest men. [ Lowell ]

It was the nightingale, and not the lark, that pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear; nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree. [ William Shakespeare ]

Wise sayings are not only for ornament, but for action and business, having a point or edge, whereby knots in business are pierced and discovered. [ Bacon ]

There is strength deep bedded in our hearts, of which we reck but little till the shafts of heaven have pierced its fragile dwelling. Must not earth be rent before her gems are found? [ Mrs. Hemans ]

When thou forgivest, - the man who has pierced thy heart stands to thee in the relation of the sea-worm that perforates the shell of the mussel which straightway closes the wound with a pearl. [ Richter ]