Essays Biographical and Critical: Chiefly on English PoetsMacmillan, 1856 - 475 pages |
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Page 7
... hand . " This William , being in- clined naturally to poetry and acting , came to London , I guess , about 18 ; and was an actor at one of the play - houses , and did act exceedingly well . ( Now B. Jonson was never a good actor , but ...
... hand . " This William , being in- clined naturally to poetry and acting , came to London , I guess , about 18 ; and was an actor at one of the play - houses , and did act exceedingly well . ( Now B. Jonson was never a good actor , but ...
Page 9
... hand , is a dramatist , whose function it was not to communicate , but to create . Had he been a drama- tist of the same school as Ben Jonson , indeed , using the drama as a means of spreading , or , at all events , as a medium through ...
... hand , is a dramatist , whose function it was not to communicate , but to create . Had he been a drama- tist of the same school as Ben Jonson , indeed , using the drama as a means of spreading , or , at all events , as a medium through ...
Page 20
... hand and seal . But this being allowed , we are willing to agree with all that is said of him , by way of indicating the immense variety of faculties , dispositions , and acquirements of which his character was built up . Vast ...
... hand and seal . But this being allowed , we are willing to agree with all that is said of him , by way of indicating the immense variety of faculties , dispositions , and acquirements of which his character was built up . Vast ...
Page 23
... hand , and all poured forth together , to rise and fall on the waves of an esta- blished cadence . Such lightness and ease in the manner , and such prodigious wealth and depth in the matter , are combined in no other writer . How the ...
... hand , and all poured forth together , to rise and fall on the waves of an esta- blished cadence . Such lightness and ease in the manner , and such prodigious wealth and depth in the matter , are combined in no other writer . How the ...
Page 24
... hand , the value of all that the second man could do , if he adhered to a course precisely similar , must suffer from the fact that he was following in the footsteps of a predecessor of such unapproachable excellence ; or , on the other ...
... hand , the value of all that the second man could do , if he adhered to a course precisely similar , must suffer from the fact that he was following in the footsteps of a predecessor of such unapproachable excellence ; or , on the other ...
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Common terms and phrases
acquaintance angels antique appearance Barrett Beckford Ben Jonson Bristol Brooke Street Burgum burletta called Catcott character Chatterton circumstance Clayfield Coffee-house Colston's school concrete connexion death Devil drama Dryden England English expression fact faculty fancy feeling genius Goethe Goethe's going habit hand honour human imagination imitation intellectual kind language letter literary literature lived London Lord Luther Magazine matter means Mephistopheles metre Milton mind nation nature never night North Briton Paradise Lost passage passion peculiar person piece poem poet poetical poetry political poor prose published regard respect rhyme Rowley Satan satire Scotchmen Scottish seems Shakespeare Shoreditch Sir Herbert Croft sister song soul spirit Stella style Swift terton things THOMAS CHATTERTON thou thought tion town tragedy UNIVERSITY verse walk Walpole Whig Whiggism whole Wilkes words Wordsworth write written young
Popular passages
Page 11 - Desiring this man's art and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy contented least; Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, Haply I think on thee, and then my state, Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate; For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
Page 3 - I remember, the players have often mentioned it as an honour to Shakespeare, that in his writing (whatsoever he penned) he never blotted out a line. My answer hath been, Would he had blotted a thousand.
Page 54 - Thus Satan, talking to his nearest mate, With head uplift above the wave, and eyes That sparkling blazed ; his other parts besides, Prone on the flood, extended long and large, Lay floating many a rood...
Page 433 - Less Philomel will deign a song, In her sweetest saddest plight, Smoothing the rugged brow of night, While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke, Gently o'er the accustom'd oak : Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly, Most musical, most melancholy...
Page 452 - And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom!
Page 47 - I was confirmed in this opinion, that he, who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well hereafter in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem...
Page 370 - How exquisitely the individual Mind (And the progressive powers perhaps no less Of the whole species) to the external World Is fitted : — and how exquisitely, too — Theme this but little heard of among men — The external World is fitted to the Mind; And the creation (by no lower name Can it be called) which they with blended might Accomplish: — this is our high argument.
Page 453 - ... boy, That he shouts with his sister at play ! O well for the sailor lad, That he sings in his boat on the bay ! And the stately ships go on To their haven under the hill ; But O for the touch of a...
Page 453 - And the stately ships go on To their haven under the hill ; But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand, And the sound of a voice that is still ! Break, break, break, At the foot of thy crags, O Sea ! But the tender grace of a day that is dead Will never come back to me.
Page 27 - They that have power to hurt and will do none, That do not do the thing they most do show, Who, moving others, are themselves as stone...