The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope

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Routledge, Warne, and Routledge, 1859 - 478 pages

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Page 79 - Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law, Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw: Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight, A little louder, but as empty quite: Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage, And beads and prayer-books are the toys of age: Pleased with this bauble still, as that before; Till tired he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er.
Page 85 - Father of all ! in every age, In every clime adored, By saint, by savage, and by sage, Jehovah, Jove, or Lord ! Thou Great First Cause, least understood: Who all my sense confined To know but this, that Thou art good. And that myself am blind...
Page 101 - Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys, Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'er enjoys : So well-bred spaniels civilly delight In mumbling of the game they dare not bite, Eternal smiles his emptiness betray, As shallow streams run dimpling all the way. Whether in florid impotence he speaks, And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks; Or at the ear of Eve, familiar Toad, Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad, In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies, Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or...
Page 85 - Teach me to feel another's woe, To hide the fault I see; That mercy I to others show, That mercy show to me.
Page 20 - Tis not enough no harshness gives offence, The sound must seem an Echo to the sense: Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows; But when loud surges lash the sounding shoar, The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar: When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, The line too labours, and the words move slow; Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.
Page 77 - With too much knowledge for the sceptic side, With too much weakness for the stoic's pride, He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest; In doubt to deem himself a god or beast; In doubt his mind or body to prefer; Born but to die, and reasoning but to err...
Page 10 - No more shall nation against nation rise, Nor ardent warriors meet with hateful eyes. Nor fields with gleaming steel be cover'd o'er, The brazen trumpets kindle rage no more ; But useless lances into scythes shall bend, And the broad falchion in a plough-share end.
Page 28 - And screen'd in shades from day's detested glare, She sighs for ever on her pensive bed, Pain at her side, and Megrim at her head.
Page 19 - For works may have more wit than does 'em good, As bodies perish through excess of blood. Others for language all their care express, And value books, as women men, for dress: Their praise is still, — the style is excellent; The sense, they humbly take upon content.
Page 20 - whispers through the trees:" If crystal streams "with pleasing murmurs creep...

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