“The” Works of Thomas De Quincey: Leaders in literatureA. & C. Black, 1862 |
Common terms and phrases
absolute Adeimantus Africa amongst ancient arose astrologer Athenæum Athenian Athens called character Charles Lamb Christian civilisation colour Count Julian Dahra Danube dialogue diction didactic drama earth effect Egypt Eloisa English Euripides existed expression fact fancy feeling French Gebir grandeur Grecian Greece Greek tragedy heart Heracleida Herodotus honour human idea idolatry instance intellectual interest Iolaus justice king labour lady Lamb Lamb's Landor language Latin literature Macedon means mind mode modern moral nations nature necessity never Nile object original Pagan palæstra particular passion perhaps Pericles philosophic Plato poem poet poetry Pope Pope's Portia principle purpose reader reason regards Rennell respect Roman satiric secondly seems sense separate social Socrates solemn sometimes Southey speak stage style supposed thing thought tion tragic true truth vast Walter Savage Landor whilst whole word write
Popular passages
Page 41 - For forms of government let fools contest ; Whate'er is best administered is best...
Page 26 - twould a saint provoke" (Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke), " No, let a charming chintz, and Brussels lace Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face : One would not, sure, be frightful when one's dead — And, Betty, give this cheek a little red.
Page 35 - Calista prov'd her conduct nice, And good Simplicius asks of her advice. Sudden, she storms! she raves! You tip the wink, But spare your censure; Silia does not drink : All eyes may see from what the change arose, All eyes may see — a pimple on her nose. Papillia, wedded to her am'rous spark, Sighs for the shades — "How charming is a park!
Page 31 - For modes of faith, let graceless zealots fight; His can't be wrong whose life is in the right; In faith and hope the world will disagree.
Page xii - ... professional or merely personal interest, even though presenting itself in the shape of a book, will not belong to literature. So far the definition is easily narrowed; and it is as easily expanded. For not only is much that takes a station in books not literature, but, inversely, much that really is literature never reaches a station in books. The weekly sermons of Christendom, that vast pulpit literature which acts so extensively upon the popular mind— to warn, to uphold, to renew, to comfort,...
Page 3 - Scriptures speak not of the understanding, but of ' the understanding heart', — making the heart, ie the great intuitive (or nondiscursive) organ, to be the interchangeable formula for man in his highest state of capacity for the infinite. Tragedy, romance, fairy tale, or epopee, all alike restore to man's mind the ideals of justice, of hope, of truth, of mercy, of retribution, which else (left to the support of daily life in its realities) would languish for want of sufficient illustration. What...
Page 3 - The commonest novel, by moving in alliance with human fears and hopes, with human instincts of wrong and right, sustains and quickens those affections.
Page 7 - And of this let every one be assured — that he owes to the impassioned books which he has read, many a thousand more of emotions than he can consciously trace back to them. Dim by their origination, these emotions yet arise in him, and mould him through life like forgotten incidents of his childhood.
Page 6 - Ovid, never equalled on this earth for the gaiety of their movement and the capricious graces of their narrative, are read by all Christendom. This man's people and their monuments are dust; but he is alive : he has survived them, as he told us that he had it in his commission to do, by a thousand years ;
Page 152 - MB history, a repose affectingly contrasting with the calamities and internal storms cf his life. I have heard more persons than I can now distinctly recall, observe of Lamb when sleeping, that his countenance in that state assumed an expression almost seraphic, from its intellectual beauty of outline, its child-like simplicity, and its benignity.